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werezmastarbucks · 18 hours ago

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280 minutes

best friends! yoongi x f!reader au

in which you find an unorthodox way to deal with your best friend's crush on you

word count: 8922

warnings / tags my endless ramblings: some of the parts of this may or may not have been supplied from my dreams abt yoongi i am very normal about him. self-indulgent, almost no plot, just thirst lol. insomnia, pining, fluff, unreciprocated feelings kinda, yoongi is horny all the time, lots of touching and escalating. i have a rare mental disorder (joking) where i confuse WAIST and WASTE not because i don't know them, but because i type too fast and edit too lazily. super self-conscious about this one

"Yoongi behaved today. He patted me on the head even. Didn't kick or pinch"

The old notebook shakes in your hands because you're laughing. You were six and even then, already kept track of his misdemeanor. Yoongi has been such a menace in pre-school that his normal days earned special entries in your journals. Like, wow, he didn't kick me even a single time today. Time to write it down and keep the memory forever.

Your mom snickers when you show her the notebook, paper now feeling crusty because of how many years it's been kept in the drawer, safe from the daylight, under piles of postcards, pictures, and stacks of poems from childhood.

"Always had a thing for you, poor Yoongi".

You frown at her, for always ruining a sweet moment. Yoongi is neither poor nor dependent. He hasn't always had a thing for you... makes you uncomfortable, and more guilty.

273

When you have seasonal insomnia, only the true comfort helps. All June and the first ten days of July, you don't sleep. Then the same thing happens in November for a whole month again. It comes like allergy; or like with some people, seasonal decline. You don't feel any different; your brain just decides not to sleep.

Recently you discovered the solution to that, which makes you feel bad. You know Yoongi, the best friend you've known for the most of your life, has been in love with you. You know he deals with it mostly, sometimes with effort. You also find out you can only realistically fall asleep before the sun rises if he is in the same apartment as you. Something about his unwavering comfort around you, the safety he provides, something about the way he is trying to step really quietly, before crashing a floor lamp on the side by accident. You don't get butterflies; you don't like him like that. You love him as a human: the guy who was your company at algebra: two idiots just trying to survive. You've seen too much of him to fall in love: seen him brush his teeth and pee, roll on the floor wrapped in dirty sheets, seen him kiss your classmate during Spin the Bottle, seen him vomit when you were both teenagers, seen him pale with sickness, and sneering when he was angry and capricious and thirteen, and super annoying all the time.

He's seen all the same things, and he still manages to ogle at you, which is weird. But this honey boy with the light strawberry blond bob on his head is too important to you to feel uncomfortable about it anymore. Maybe it makes you a bad person. Maybe not. You need him. He needs you. You need each other on slightly different levels. You both hold on so far. You both made it to your third decade, Yoongi, having gone through the visceral tides of puberty without pushing you away.

You would love him to move on, but he seemingly refuses to do that. He blinks hard, standing in the door, looking at you in shrimp shape in his bed, clutching the edge of the blanket. You are so tired you wouldn't move even if a bulldozer ran through the wall. Every time his figure looms somewhere in the background, your eyelids become heavy, and you need to grab on that moment because you won't get a second chance.

"We need to set some ground rules", he says, and you don't like the way his voice sounds. You open one eye, ready to beg to leave this conversation for tomorrow. The little engines in your brain start again, slowly, with a grumble.

"Like maybe you text me before coming over at, like, one in the morning. And no perfume if you sleep in my bed".

You even raise your head, a crease on your face.

"What are you on about? Let me sleep, dammit".

It's a bit capricious, you know, but you are so used to him being mega agreeable with you, that you don't see the lines anymore. His hand, peeking out from the long sleeve, on the door frame. The same way as his eyes peek out from under the soft hair that looks dark-golden in the night-soaked room. He sniffs through his nose and makes the hard face, that provokes his chin to dimple. You know all that without looking at him. His mouth forms a left-tilting line. Dude's like a real cat: when he's angry, his eyes actually move, become more angular, like he gets into a hunter mode.

"Fine, but I'm sleeping with you then", he mutters in a final tone, like it can scare you. You open the blanket and very reluctantly move to the middle of the bed.

Light steps on the floor, he is trotting like a ghost. He is too light, too small to your liking; Yoongi isn't your type. He is your type of human, for sure, but every part of him as a male strikes just one degree off for you. Maybe you have developed an almost biological barrier against him, knowing him for so long, because your brain perceives him as a brother and tries to prevent incest.

He looks like a twenty-year old honey boy, but grunts like an old grandpa, getting into bed. Yoongi is always warm to lie against, just soft enough, but has these heavy arms; once he throws one hand over your ribs, you hum.

"Yoongi".

You move his hand up and down, trying to find a less fragile spot of yourself, to rest it. He won't budge.

"What day are you on?" his voice requests into the back of his head, and suddenly you realize his mouth is touching your hair.

"Period or insomnia?" you clarify, trying to move away from him slightly.

The hand tenses, restricting the movement.

"Insomnia".

"What day is it?"

"Seventeenth of May", he sighs, sensing sarcasm.

"Seventeenth day then".

You tskt, punch the pillow, try not to perk your butt. You spooned since you were both ten years old. When Yoongi finally overcame his street fighter phase and stopped giving you bruises. Now you think maybe it was the time he realized he liked you; created neuron connections in his brain and matured enough to transcend it not through violence, but through support.

You grew up together.

You can't shake off the habit of resting next to him.

His palm disregards the difference between peaceful, unassuming touch, and tenderness. It opens and then bends fingers, and he starts lightly scratching your stomach, where he thinks the period pain lives.

"Stop it".

He barely registers the motion.

"Sleep".

"Stop rubbing me".

"Shut up and sleep", Yoongi raises his hand and presses it lightly on the side of your head, to squash you deeper into the pillow.

"We talked about this, Yoongi".

He produces a shuddered sigh. He is a little more distressed than usual; moves his knees against yours, doing god knows what. He is generally a calm person, but once he is under the blanket, the first ten minutes he fidgets like he is planting his own spores to create an appropriate environment for himself.

You talked about it many times. There's friendly touch and there's romantic touch. And there's Yoongi touch. Uncalled for, unwelcome, painfully caring. You feel bad for shaking his hand off when he tucks hair away behind your ear. Sometimes it's like he thinks you won't notice, won't pay attention, that he keeps his hand on your back for too long, assisting. That before taking your hand, he traces your forearm with his finger, like a lunatic. That when spooning, he presses his face into the back of your head, like knocking on the locked door.

"You have bad days? I have bad days, too", he defends, with a sharp reproach in his voice. "You come over whenever you want, without bothering to ask, maybe I am having it harder today than the other days".

Your nostrils flare. It's fair, but you don't want to admit it. Instead, you raise yourself on the elbow. Sleep starts retreating again, you lose it, like a sunray that's almost reached your skin on a gloomy day, and then suddenly started drifting away.

"Fine, I'll-"

He pushes your down on the shoulder, again with an open palm.

"Didn't say I want you gone".

"Don't start it".

"Start..."

For a minute, you bicker into your respective pillows, which turns into barking, then you roll onto your back, only to meet his pale face glowing in the dark. Yoongi sleeps in everything and anything he wears that day; studies so much that sometimes he collapses on the bed in jeans, sweatshirts and sweaters. His beige home shirt is stained under the collar with tomato that burst onto him when he bit into it. A month ago.

You want to say something snappy but can't. You know how unfair this is. Yoongi is piercing you with his night stare, the look reserved only for darkness when he can let go a little bit. Not pleading, not asking for anything, but desperate. In the moments like this, you can actually see the beauty. He is pretty handsome; someone should pick him up. Instead of going out there and living life, dating, he keeps staring at you in silence, submerged in his bed.

"You know how you make me feel", he says finally, "just don't make it worse".

The guilt clutches you by the hips.

"That's why I want to leave. I'm sorry".

"Don't. I'll behave".

That's what Yoongi has been doing around you almost the whole time you've known him. Behave.

His eyes flicker, lashes cover them for a moment, then he closes them tiredly. He turns on his back, and his honey hair parts on his forehead revealing his arched, sharp eyebrows.

"Have you thought that maybe it's just... horny?" you ask suddenly. He opens his eyes, staring into the ceiling. His lips twitch.

"Or are you really in love with me?"

Since you can't sleep, you will rip.

"It's both", he says bluntly and sharp. Yoongi slurrs often, not bothering to open his mouth properly. They call it the lazy Daegu dialect. And a lot of people find it attractive; you always thought it's slightly annoying. Like he is lazy to even properly speak. But at least it gives you a signal when he is not to be pushed further. When words sound academically, Yoongi is on his last nerve.

Maybe you will lose him soon. Either something inappropriate, unpretty will happen, or he'll snap. You can't give him what he wants, and he can't stop wanting it. His monstrous patience makes no sense to you, but you never question it because you get his friendship out of it. Unhealthy symbiosis needs an intervention, because you're both inside it. Only someone outside can tell what the resolution is.

He doesn't date and hook up. Yoongi is what they call a demisexual: one person at a time, takes ages for him to warm up. This is loyalty wasted.

You stare at him for a while. Honey head on a grey pillow, a sight so habitual to you that you don't even register the softness it unlocks in you. His pouting pushes your buttons. His lower lip sticking out, jaws moving slightly: chewing on his own skin.

You sigh heavily. Then again.

"Okay".

He turns his head slightly, looking at you with his unimpressed eye. The corner of it, lips still lopsided.

"I have a proposition", you say, trying to look away. You punch your fingers into your eyes, trying to remove the shame from them. Rub so much that tears start coming out.

"What is it?" he asks. Impossible to tell what he thinks by his voice: you'd have to touch his throat. When you leave your eyes alone, and the vision returns after a snap of colourful noise, he is still looking at you, but less strictly. His hand is resting under the blanket, unmoving, but the heat of his body just a touch away.

"You need to release it? Go on then".

His face doesn't change at first, but on the opposite, the expression of caution cements deeper.

"Seven minutes in heaven. Do whatever you want", you sigh, watching his eyes grow wider. "I don't move. You..." you need to gulp all of a sudden. "But no genitalia touching".

His eyebrows relax with shock. He flaps his black eyes at you, the cheekbones go tense. Maybe you watch him more than you thought. Maybe you are going in the wrong direction.

Yoongi lifts himself up on the elbow.

"Is this a trap?"

His face is above you, studying hard, the fist of supporting arm right next to your ear. In one motion, he swirls in bed, still under the blanket, not like a human but like a wave.

"Are you for real?"

Maybe he is having a nut crisis, because he doesn't ask about the morality of it, only,

"You're not joking?"

His warm, mint-flavoured breath is on your face.

"No".

"No to what?"

"I'm not joking. I can't have you cling from me around people like it's been lately".

You see conversing is over; his eyes scanning your face, like he is far away from you, like you are locked in a glass box and he is admiring you without hearing your voice.

"Get the phone. Seven minutes".

He darts to the side immediately, grabbing his three-year old Samsung, and drops it next to your head.

"You sure?" he breathes out. "I will touch you".

You swallow some unease.

"I just want things to go back to normal between us. I don't want to-"

"I got it", he sets the timer, barely listening. The lizard brain and the human brain of his are both activated, and battling. You see the purple ring on white, glowing painfully in the dark. Before Yoongi lowers himself, he suddenly gets into your face again.

"Wait. Are tits genitalia?"

It's like you can play tennis in his head right now. Nothing there. You can see it in his glassy eyes. And this helplessness makes you feel for him even more. Out of body experience. This does feel wrong, and right at the same time. You can't hold back a snicker,

"No, they are secondary sexual characteristics".

Your words travel into his mouth directly, there's barely any space between you.

"I will pull your shirt up", it sounds like a threat. You nod to his phone half-way under your pillow.

"Your time is ticking".

Yoongi stops you with a kiss. Oh, it is weird weird. You feel like a subject in an experiment, lucky that the intern is gentle. This, you think, must be what your cat feels like. Constant unconsented love showering. Yoongi parts your lips with his flexible tongue, damn, he is a good, technical kisser. Where did he learn? You don't move. Don't respond. Don't push him away. You breathe through your nose and try to relax, matching your pace to his. The air leaves his nose like bullets, shooting hot. Yoongi's hands grip at your sides in a more familiar gesture, because you hug a lot. This gives you time to ruminate (you've never felt his round, puffy cheeks so close, it's kinda cute; Yoongi purrs into your mouth when his hand slides under your waist and clutches the lower hem of your sleeping tee): what's the difference between love and friendship? You know you feel love towards him. Yoongi is easily lovable, he is a really cool person, actually. Why can't you transfer this usual love, transit it into romantic? Where is the line between what's normal and what's taboo? You don't mind him, (his wet lips slip off your mouth finally and place a kiss on your cheek, then he lowers his head further and tickles your face with his hair. You rarely get kissed on the neck, if ever. Yoongi is determined not to leave a single centimeter of you unkissed), it doesn't disgust you. You don't put a lot of effort into enduring what's happening. It's a little curious, and maybe heavy because he stops controlling how much weight he puts on you, engaged in vampire kisses. So, why can't you date? You don't feel that spark (he doesn't take off earrings for the night, and the pleasant cold of the metal pressed under your chin encourages you to tilt your head back to open up a little. You close your eyes to help yourself think better. Your pulse is steady. The sound of kisses, the shape of his breathing next to your ear, is almost like lo-fi music Yoongi sometimes fidgets with, as a hobby. Damn, he's a great dude. He should find himself a girlfriend...). Is this how friends with benefits starts? What's the whole deal there? You always wondered. If you are friends, means you like each other as humans. AND you have sex, means you like each other physically. Why not date then? You will run yourself into the same puzzle. The glow of the phone next to the pillow blinds you a little, and you reach for it, catching the remaining time: three minutes left. You turn it upside down and dive into the comforting darkness again. Sometimes friends experiment with each other, and it doesn't leave a trace. Lots of teens do that (Yoongi's hand gets under your t-shirt, warm palm sliding up the stomach, and it makes you shiver out of surprise. He stops for a second, wrecked breaths falling on your collarbone. Are you okay? he asks. You say yes. His hair is so fluffy and smells like grapes).

"You are, like, criminally pretty", he mumbles, and his hand grabs your left breast, hungrily. You blink several times, adjusting your breathing like when a doctor shoves their finger in your ass. They usually say: just breathe, and you do.

"Thanks".

"The waist-hip ratio, y/n, you are perfect".

He is speaking his lazy dialect again, and you can admit, his voice is pretty. Yoongi is pretty. He reminds you of those late Medieval paintings, bordering on Renaissance period, where artists started to turn to light again and wanted to draw angels.

He rolls your shirt up carefully. Not to catch a stray eye contact, you keep your eyes closed, mind busy with philosophical rumination. The implications of what you've done and how it will affect your relationship; but most likely, little to nothing will change, because people do stranger things all of the time, and with worse intentions. You won't make a bit deal (Yoongi drops down and slides his teeth bluntly on top of your stomach with a sigh. You can feel his boner as he is perched on your knees, almost breaking your kneecaps, through the soft pants. Yoongi doesn't give you butterflies but leaves butterfly kisses, colourful, around the belly button. Your stomach hitches, sucks on itself out of sheer reflex when his lips cover your right nipple) out of it. Before his tongue makes one full circle, the phone under your pillow erupts in shrill ringing, which makes the both of you flinch. You even jump a little. Your eyes burst open to the reality of white ceiling above you.

You feel his shoulders fall. The hand keeping your shirt rolled up under your chin tenses. One second decides whether you can stay friends, or not, and Yoongi sighs into your skin, raising his head and leaving your nipple a bit colder.

He is angry?

He reaches for the phone and finally stops your wincing, turning the sound off. You push your shirt down while he does that, and the light from the phone shines on the vein pulsating in his throat.

"I gotta jerk off", he says, and jumps off the bed, then slides across the floor like a duckling. His home clothes are all oversize because he stole them from his older brother who inherited their father's height. The trouser legs cover the heels of his feet flapping quietly on the linoleum, a hand grabs the doorframe to control the rotation as he leaves the room. You turn back to your side, unbothered, slightly confused, and a little bit softer than before.

266

"You got tea?"

Seokjin's head snaps to you, and his finger points:

"In the kitchen".

"I mean normal tea, not the green shit".

He pulls up his nose the way only Jin can, starts looking like a llama.

"My mom got all tea".

"Can I drink it?"

He thrashes his head in the air, kept from an interesting conversation by your questions,

"Of course you can, y/n!"

You chuckle and get up, knees a little numb from sitting cross-legged.

Hobi throws his cards on the floor.

"If you had been a lil more patient, would've gotten all mine", he looks up at you. You shrug. His girlfriend mimics you with laughter. Yoongi is on the couch, only his cheeks visible from how low his head is: reading something off Namjoon's phone, together, their dark and honey-light hair clashing. Namjoon nudges him in the side as you turn away and get to the stairs. Jin's mom's house is big, two-storey; expensive orange pans in the kitchen displayed behind the glass proudly. Cute place. You drag a chair to the cupboard to look for tea; only second time around in here, since Jin decided to take a gap year and stay with his mom, and now lounges here all the time, organizing these softcore-student parties.

Someone pats you right on the butt. "Someone"; of course. Yoongi.

"It's in here".

Boys are as thick as thieves. Rarely have you seen boy companies so relatively large being very close: Yoongi has six close friends. You not included; you are his tear, as he explains. Something already in between. You're losing him.

You frown at him from your high spot to reprimand, and he accepts your gaze open-eyed. Doe-face, lips in a bowtie, chin dimpled. He's a little tipsy, but not enough to not understand things.

"Where?" you say finally. He points to a sliding drawer and walks over to help.

Together, you watch the kettle boil. You never tell him to go away; he isn't out of place. Trying to regulate your emotions is tiring. You wait, then tear the tea bag open and look at him:

"Do you need one?"

He shakes his head. Yoongi is a man of extremes: drinks either water or the strongest alcohol he can find around. As soon as your tea bag is inside the mug, he uses the moment when you get distracted by the photos on Jin's mom's fridge, and snatches the package from the table to throw it away.

"You're obsessed with order".

He doesn't reply, just moves his jaws like he is thinking.

"Can we do it again?"

You stall for a couple of seconds, pretending to not understand. Then look away at the kettle again.

"I knew it would happen".

"You should have. What kind of proposition is that? I can't stop thinking about you".

He says it so simply, because you two have the luxury of throwing the awkwardness out the window. So many things experienced together, sicknesses, summer camps, drowning in the local lake, - that sexual activities are but the only thing left unshared.

You pout and don't notice. Yoongi looks at you carefully, then his expression changes.

"No, seriously, what kind of proposition is that? Don't you feel violated?"

Your eyes flicker up at him, then the kettle clicks ready.

"By you? No. I know you won't hurt me".

"You were completely dead".

"I told you I don't move. I don't..." you swallow a tough lump down your throat, "don't like you like that".

You maintain eye contact instead of giving a hug. Thinking that if you hold him while saying it, it will be even more cruel. Yoongi doesn't look at you like he used to. You're both grown. It's funny, you're not the same people anymore, and it could almost be a clean slate. He looks at you the way a man looks at a woman: the gaze you've experienced from others, who also wanted you. From above, as he is taller. With the tilt of a head, instinctive, betraying intimacy. Eyes searching with intention. The difference between Yoongi and others - he will never lay his hand on you without permission. Or so you used to think. Lately he slips.

"Then why do it at all? You made it worse", his voice is hard although he still slurrs softly. Then he thinks, and his brows draw together,

"Do you... offer that to all guys who are into you?"

Your face distorts in outrage. For a moment, you can't even find words and look at the mug full of hot water, considering it.

"Fuck you", you finally spew, "you calling me a whore?"

He keeps up the stare like he is balancing a sword.

"No, I am asking you".

You huff, catching only air, and a grudge.

"How dare you. I am inventing twisted fucking ways to keep our friendship, and you're... uh", you can't even find words sharp enough to throw at him. He blinks in surrender.

"You don't have to do it to keep me", he utters. Even fighting, you step up to each other, forming a protection bubble around yourselves. Like you did at school. The whole place was always gossiping that you were dating, and you and Yoongi constantly laughed at it. Sincerely. You have no idea, maybe his laughter wasn't it.

"You just asked for another round", you remind him, dipping the tea bag desperately.

"I thought it's you giving me a chance, not... letting me use you. Like an animal".

For a moment, he seems disgusted. The hoodie Yoongi is wearing is a familiar hoodie; you're pretty sure it used to belong to you. You remember the signature-like sewn in name of the brand and the white ties.

"A chance?" you marvel, "a chance at what?"

"Winning you over", he says simply, "no?"

Your eyebrows shoot up.

How else can you explain it to him? You've said it at least a dozen times, during arguments and quiet conversations, and casual chats, and now, as well. You don't find him attractive. Not the honey hair covering eyebrows, soft strands tickling his ears (and he constantly moves it away with two fingers). Not the too-pink lips pressed together, not his wide stride, nothing. Not the hand covered half-way by the long sleeve. Not the eyes, not the knees, and definitely not his habit of speaking in pout. His desperate, hot kisses that night left no impression on you except for competitive respect for his passion. And awe, at being wanted like that.

"We did just about anything", he reads your mind, too, "except that. Give me seven more minutes. I will make you feel good".

"And if I say no?"

"Then I need to go to the bathroom".

You sip the tea, forgetting how hot it is, and burn your tongue. Yoongi winces in compassion. Every time you want to tell him to fuck off, he does something like that.

You go up the stairs again, together, and before he can make it to the living room, you tug him by the sleeve.

"That's my hoodie, isn't it?"

He nods.

"I don't remember. This room is off..."

You push the door open quietly, listening to the voices of your friends.

"It's his mum's-"

"Get your phone".

He shuts up. Closes the door while you stand in front of the bed of Jin's rich, gracious mother, and then look at her wardrobe.

He follows you like a shadow, the phone in his hand, then when he gets surprised, his brows disappear under the hair. His skin is glowing. Classic boy shit: he sometimes forgets to even brush his teeth in the morning, and yet he is pretty like a picture. Your hand lies on the open wardrobe door.

"There's too little space".

You shrug.

"Isn't that the whole point?"

Yoongi grows a tad darker, as his teeth press together. You see the exact moment his brains click and evaporate again, as he pushes you inside, after clocking the timer. You aren't ready this soon, so you gasp slightly, pressed against the narrow wall. You want to say that maybe yeah, it is a bad choice: some hangers with dresses are right in your face; something pokes painfully into your side. By the shape of it, behind your knees, a vacuum cleaner is tucked into the corner. Yoongi uses the space effectively, like he has been in this situation before. After closing the little door, he pushes the array of dresses behind himself, kicks something aside, keeping you at the wall. You try to say something about the vacuum cleaner and how unstable it makes you, that you knees need to cave in, to maintain balance. You get no chance. Yoongi crashes you with a kiss, requesting the tip of your tongue. You already forgot; and he didn't. He sucks it gently, making it feel like you're getting vacuumed yourself, soothing the burnt spot.

His hand goes to the small of your back, arching you towards him, and the other cradles your face like he is rehearsing for your wedding.

You don't really have time to discern if it makes you feel uncomfortable. Your feet are fighting for equilibrium against the damn vacuum, while Yoongi nudges the plastic hangers with the top of his head and ouches into your mouth. Your hands drop and hang by your sides like damp sleeves. Fists convulse, fingers curling, out of instinct. You want to feel the texture of his hair, for some reason deluded that if you touch it, it will feel sweet. But you don't want to encourage him; if this is his chance at winning you over, by all means. But it's his job. He slides his face to the side and sucks on the skin under your chin.

"Not the hickey!" you hiss.

He doesn't react, taking a fraction of a second more to finish it. Then his free hand grabs your wrist. What now. You did say he can do whatever he wants; he guides your hand to himself, and at first you tense your elbow, but when it crawls up, you relax. Yoongi pushes it under the hoodie and up his stomach, and plasters your palm on his side. He is breathing like an animal; you feel his ribs, moving up and down, lungs inflating. It makes you think of a horse: mute, durable companion, carrying you away, beautiful and full of grace.

Yoongi places his hands low on your back, tugging your jeans slightly down to find the dimples. He presses on them, just hard enough, to send a jolt of unexpected shock down your thighs.

"Crap", you gasp. You knees wobble for a second. "Do it again".

You try to take a breath to stabilize yourself, and instead inhale a bunch of his hair as he moves his head below your face. Honey boy. He smells sweet, like fresh pastry. Yoongi presses again, then grabs your butt softly, fingers getting dangerously low.

"No pussy touching", you remind him, surprised at the slight breathiness of your own voice.

"Through the clothes", he mutters.

"No".

His hand slides up the wall behind you, and he steps closer.

"I'll fall".

Yoongi grabs you around the waist. Your hand still on his ribs; fair's fair, so you keep it there, catching the beating of his mad heart. You rotate your palm for comfort, feeling what you know is a big birthmark that you call a cow. Always called a cow. Because it's shaped like a spot on a cow. He makes you step aside, and you have to cling on him, or you'll fall. The wardrobe is cluttered, it smells of plastic wrapping (perhaps from the vacuum cleaner) and clothes. Not old, not fresh, either. Your hand that flew by itself to Yoongi's neck as he moved you away from the corner, feels the moist under the hair, at the roots. He dives right back. Doesn't waste time, smothering you with kisses around your face.

"Open your mouth", he asks, huskily. His thighs are pressed against yours, out of restriction of the wardrobe. You chose it. You have no one else to blame for his hard boner pushing you in the leg. You take the air through your nose and obey, and Yoongi does something unexpected. Covering you in a kiss again, he plunges his fingers right under your ribs, under the shirt, and presses, like he's checking the lungs. Clinical, again, you lose control, ambushed from all sides. Suddenly it doesn't matter that you don't like him like that. The tiny goosebumps run amuck down your legs while his fingers press into the solar plexus. The contrast between slightly painful and the tenderness of his kiss sends your brain into a panic mode. It's Yoongi, god dammit, the brain screams, it's incest! You have to shove it down forcefully. The taste of grapes gets onto your tongue, and then the timer beeps.

Yoongi groans with an effort now. His fingers leave an impression on your stomach as he puts his forehead against your chin, panting, like he's been running. Your hand loses the friction against his body, and falls down, and Yoongi presses his arm sharply, to keep it inside for a little. He turns off the timer: ringing is much less deafening now.

You both listen to the room outside.

"Tell them I am shitting myself", he asks, once you get out, and into a blindingly light, uncomfortably big bedroom. Yoongi keeps your hand in his, without registering.

"I'll tell them you feel sick", you pivot with a frown, "why does it have to be shit?"

He shrugs and scratches his head, then his gaze drops to your clasped hands.

"You got subscription?"

Your eye twitches.

259

Subscription means he has to pay something for it.

Don't ask.

You don't know what this is. Yoongi now comes over and does the dishes and dusts the place because those are the two house chores you hate the most. It's like friendly prostitution, you feel. He does the dishes and makes the dinner for you, while you do your essays in the room, and then for seven minutes he French-kisses you and holds your butt. He requests 40 sessions. You gape your mouth open: that's 280 minutes in heaven. That's longer than a full movie. You decide to at least take out those three times that it already happened, and search for your calculator. Because you and him were two idiots at algebra, just trying to survive.

252

It gets to a point where you continue the conversation while he is taking off your pants. You notice things now; dammit. It makes you flustered. The birthmark on the side of his nose is actually cute. And the way he shortly bares his teeth in effort when the tight jeans get stuck on your hips because you're sitting.

"...but her actual boyfriend called her on that night and started screaming over the phone that he is having a stroke".

"You can't scream during a stroke", you muse.

"Well, it depends", Yoongi pours all his suppressed desire to touch you into these sessions now. Aside from that, he has become more than adequate. Friends stopped giving you weird glances. You don't have to scold him anymore, remind him. He doesn't reach out unnecessarily, and during family gatherings, which happen from time to time. So, this actually works. Only, is it worth it, really?

Now that he knows he has loads of time left, he takes it slowly, unnerving you to no end. You always have an option to back out. Bury it and never speak about it again. The catch is - you don't hate it. June is still dragging out, and you still can't sleep, unless you're with him. And the view of his collarbones below the worn-out white home tee is comforting, grounding. The way his arm muscles flex softly, when he pulls the jeans off you. You know he does it with safety. He lets his palm linger on your hip for a while, telling the story.

"But that dude definitely didn't have a stroke. He felt nauseous because he hadn't eaten for three days before. Get on your stomach".

You glare at him with a fraction of unease, then do as he says. Curiosity is what drives you. You stretch across bed, tits pressed into the blanket, a little self-conscious about being left in nothing but underwear. Because the lights are on, and because the earliest, most striking memories of Yoongi were the ones where he made fun of you and tried to poke your eye with a stick. You put your chin on the backs of your hands and stare into the window.

"So did she actually run to him?"

"She did, three streets away, at midnight", Yoongi mutters, and you hear the sweet, ultra-Daegu slurring. His palm rests on the cheek of your butt lightly, then squeezes. What is life, you think. What are you two. Friends with benefits now? You get no benefit out of it, and you don't get repulsed, you just feel weird. You start getting used to his attentive, focused touch. Before you can ask how it ended, and whether the idiot was transported into the hospital, his teeth bite exactly the right spot right under the butt, into the thigh. You have to press your face to the hands to not produce sounds. You're still stubbornly clinging to the 'no moving' rule you created yourself. He kisses the inside of the knee. So tender. Then gives you a proper massage, which is so good you approve of another seven minutes back to back in order to let him finish.

He doesn't have to go to the bathroom after this one.

182

You stare at the honey boy's uneven shoulder tilt as he is chatting with some auntie. Your hand wants to nervously tuck the hair behind your ear, and you don't let it. Yoongi has hands in the back pockets of his pants. He has to flinch his head from time to time, and make the light bangs move, because they get in the eyes. Next to them, a wide table with fruit and chocolates. Some plastic flowers in ugly vases letting the sunlight through, making it blue. He nods and walks away from her, and the lady presses a kerchief to her nose. Yoongi is wearing too loose of a sweater in your opinion, one shoulder almost slipping off; and as he turns towards you, you realize it's probably your old sweater, too. Only his shoes are white, and the hair seems much more honey with black outfit. He nods at you across the room, and you nod back. He takes it as a green light to approach.

"Who was that?"

He keeps looking around, slightly bored, handing you a peeled tangerine mindlessly. You don't take it - but break a segment away, and put it in your mouth.

"I forgot her name the second she spoke to me".

You hum in agreement. Always did everything together. School, together. Fights, together (it takes two to fight). College, together, too. Although in different places. But it feels together, as well. Same life, slightly torn and pulled to the sides, but staying one thread in the middle. Now you are connected at the shoulders, observing the room and judging quietly, undubitably, with the same expression.

You don't know how to tell him that you want to bend the rules further. That keeping it casual and transactional (he does your groceries and gets to touch your tits) is the best. And that you want him to get you off. You worry that if you bring up the genitalia part, especially during a wake for his aunt's father, it will be weird.

The ceremony drags out slowly. You're left alone because the adults are all mingled and speak to each other, and you just munch fruits in the corner, not speaking necessarily, but playing the remembering game, trying to recall as many relatives as you can. You know his immediate family; know a lot of his extended family, as well. This knowledge was absorbed over the years. A name here, a picture there. You remember a tall guy with square jaw and military haircut from the time when he drove you and Yoongi, both fifteen, to the lake to swim, and Yoongi burned his back so bad that he couldn't touch it for days. It was red like meat. It was only five years ago. You have never been interested in what he has in his pants, before.

"This is fucking boring", he drops. There's nothing to do here, and he has nothing to say about that old dead bloke whatsoever. You don't breathe, hoping not to hear what you think he is about to say.

"Have shame, the man is dead", you murmur. Your fingers smell like tangerine now. Bright orange, almost acid, in the boring plain room. Yoongi smells like that, too. His mouth moves slowly, chewing, he sucks in his cheek and pouts. He pouts about everything.

"What was his name?" he looks at you, bringing his chin down. You dimple your cheeks in a non-smile. You exhale, and he notices. His eyelids cover his eyes only half-way like he is studying you. Sometimes you think his eyes look like those alien half-moon insects from that X-Files movie. They have the same glint and vitality.

"Can we go do the thing?"

"At a wake?" you hiss.

You want nothing more that to get felt up by him at the wake. The atmosphere is slow, like thick liquid. And Yoongi looks edible in black, wearing your sweater, and staring at you with those challenging and soft eyes. He always gropes you a little too hard. He always knows his limits, too.

"It's just seven minutes".

He takes out his phone, and the most terrible thing happens: your brain has learned by now that when he does that, you're about to be kissed. And you get excited. It has, in fact, unlearned that Yoongi is your brother. He never has been. His old Samsung has trained you to get agitated. You look at it, then raise his eyes and understand he most definitely knows what he's doing.

You slide against the wall into the hall of the building and look for a toilet.

It's white. Smells like water, and the tiles are too cold. The space is too big, tired paper towel hanging from the dispenser. You place your own phone on the sink area because you have no pockets on the dress, and wash your hands to clean off the citrus smell. Yoongi usually puts anything citrus directly in between your teeth, without you having to touch it, because you get anxious about the clingy smell on your fingers. But he figured it would be strange to hand feed you fruit in front of everybody. You rub your fingers with soap, again and again, and continue rubbing when he comes in, having waited a couple of minutes. You hope he didn't tell anybody that he's about to shit himself. This is the default excuse for ANYTHING at all installed in his stupid fluffy head.

He looks at you, sensually. That means something changes in his gaze. The demeanor. He tilts his head forward and keeps his mouth pressed together, his throat still. His hand reaches for your hip: you see fingers, pale, cunning, almost touching the hem of your dress.

"You haven't started the timer yet!" you cut him off. And he didn't lock the door. He says nothing; places the Samsung on the edge of the sink, and you see the numbers running down: twenty minutes left. Your gaze returns to him:

"Not that long", you can have an orgasm in that time. Yoongi clicks the lock. The welcoming throb starts in between your legs. Shhhhit.

There's not a single place in this bathroom to sit, or even stand, comfortably; everything seems dirty even though looks clean. The mirror is too big, catching every movement you two produce.

He takes your wrists and places them on the sink, covers your hands with his, calming down the citrus frenzy. The hallucination of the smell in your nostrils slowly fades away.

"I don't want to face the mirror", you hum meekly, and he glances into it at you, over your shoulder. For the first time, you see how you look together, interlocked. Pressed. In a hug. While the timer runs, his touch is obscenely gentle, arm snaking across your stomach, making sure to let you feel the fingers through the dress. He turns you around and kisses your ear through the hair. And you forget to be still; before you know it, one hand grabs at the sweater you now remember all too well. You discarded it into the depths of your wardrobe at home, deeming it too worn out for yourself. Yoongi must have fished it out on one of the occasions. And he makes it look vintage. The thick knit in curious tie-lumps under your fingers, warmed up by his body. If he is surprised by your touch, he doesn't let it show; takes your other hand and places a kiss inside the palm, then returns it where it was. The hot, wet breath a smudge on your wrist.

He doesn't try to violate you, but every time he persistently tests the waters; and every time, you shake him off. It's a ritual: his hand crawls across your waist to the hip, then makes a turn in a pivot, and slides to the inner thigh. Close enough to feel the temperature. Close enough to be able to imagine. When you remind him to back off, he brings it away, deepening the kiss.

Now, he isn't in a hurry. Don't know since when he decided it's okay to squash sessions together like that; you don't notice your own jaw moving while you think. You don't register it at all: that for the second time in a row, you return the kiss. Yoongi keeps very still, as if afraid to startle you, while your brain is playing tricks on you.

Black mourning dress with semi-transparent mesh hem has the tag on the inside, under the collar, that constantly scratches your back. From time to time, you have to wiggle to get it to rest flatly.

Yoongi sneaks up along your back, fingers going tip-toe one by one up your spine (it makes you shiver), and unzip the top of your dress slightly. Before you can protest, he leaves it, the tip of his finger touching the tiniest hairs just below your neck, getting them up. He tugs on the stubborn, rough square patch, and tears it off without a sound, yanking his hand down.

"You're gonna tear a hole in a-" he shuts you up again, throwing the tag on the sink, or inside it, one hand under your arm, caressing the thinner skin on the inside with one finger. The kiss is sloppy; it's harder to hide the palpilations in your chest in a dress that's hugging the body neatly. You breathe through your nose. He has eaten about a hundred tangerines and tastes like one. Summery, sweet, round. His finger hooks the skirt of your dress, brushing over your thigh through the tights. He pinches them, testing for fragility. His hand just lingers, the same way Yoongi himself sometimes seems to stand around, without a cause, turning his head left and right, while, in fact, calculating something atrocious. It's just there, hanging, touching, testing the fabric, until you sniff, frustrated, and have to throw your head back with overstimulation of your patience. He's done it all: kissed every little spot of your back, counted all your birthmarks; massaged your arms; licked your stomach, twisted your breasts, bruised your throat; he can go on, driving in circles, the same places again, the same little purr he produces when he gets too dizzy looking at your joint move. You can't. You buck your hips, throwing a rogue glance at the timer. Ten minutes.

Over the little experiment, Yoongi has found a new equilibrium; for him, he maybe is already in a relationship, it must be. Well, he does your dishes. Sometimes makes breakfasts when you spoon in one of your beds, even though it's way past July now. He helps you out around the house and drives you from university, goes to parties with you and also kisses your neck. What else is there to be named. He doesn't yearn anymore, he has become calm, happier, even a little too charming. Easy in everyday motions, maybe more loose than you've seen him in years. He barely ever speaks clearly anymore.

You have lost everything. The peace with which you used to pinch his side when he got on your nerves. And the pride, perhaps. Also, understanding of what's happening, at all. You threw him a rope, he grabbed the end of it and rotated you to his side, where the storms were brewing.

He leans away a little bit, keeping the hand on the side of your thigh.

"Third base?" he mutters. Stray lock stands aside on his ear; he is made of honey and rustle of clean sheets. Sharp eyes, on the opposite, are taking in your complete undoing, without any shame.

"Isn't it the second?"

The eyes crawl up in musing.

"We never fucking know anything, do we", he mutters. His hand dives in between your legs, clutching you through the clothes, and you jump, gripping the cold edge of the sink.

∞

You keep rubbing your temple, picking at the skin, and Yoongi slaps your hand lightly, a couple of times, shaking you out of the daze.

The place hums with people's coffee-soaked conversations; spoons clink, machines roar in muffled behind the counter. You perch your lower lip up, looking at the page.

"Why did I choose this..." you whisper.

"Cause you wanted to help people", he says, without looking up. Happy with his psychology assignments, he could fuck his major if that were possible, loves this so much. Maybe pulling such a weird stunt with someone who is doing so well in clinical profiling was stupid of you.

"I meant the colours", you respond, your finger tapping a highlighter, "I never liked yellow".

Yoongi looks from behind his laptop, mouth pointy, because he's exploring.

"Take mine", he pushes a pink one towards you.

You keep your eyes on him while he returns to work.

"I am thirsty, too".

He blinks rapidly, trying to keep his brain working while registering your words. And shoves his glass of bubble tea towards you, slowly.

"And I need your pen".

Yoongi looks up, wide-open and ready to pout you off to the gates of heaven with one curse, then stops.

"What are we?" you ask. He licks his lips with just the tip of his tongue, neatly, unwilling still to get out of the thinking mode.

"Who cares? You rationalize things too much".

You pick on your upper lip now, keeping your finger on the philtrum. Yoongi's looks like a little swallow with its wings spread.

"You remember that one time uncle took us to the lake? When we were fifteen?"

"When I burned my back?"

You nod.

"When you tried to catch a duck and nearly drowned".

He repeats your motion, his square teeth biting on his lower lip. Eyes on the screen. Year started. Lots of work. You feel jealous like you used to, at school.

"And you went under the water because your foot got caught on coontail?"

"I think it was eelgrass".

Since he has given it up to you, you drink his tea in small sips. He doesn't even ogle anymore, when you wrap your mouth around something.

"And I jumped after you and you started drowning me?"

"I was grabbing cause I was scared", Yoongi winces. His hand taps the table emptily, before he notices that you, in fact, have his tea now.

"I thought to myself then, while you were pushing on my shoulders, that if we die together, it's okay. I think I was ready to drown with you".

He raises his eyebrows slightly.

"Why don't we date?" you ask, lingering on the straw like it's a buoy. Panicking. Yours is just one of the mundane coffeeshop conversations, betraying your ordinary lives. He parts his lips slightly, and his face becomes too cute. Some people at school bullied Yoongi because of how pretty he was. Those lips sure deprived a lot of people of peace.

"We do everything together. Which means we like each other as humans. And we jerked each other off", you shrug, trying to make it casual. Like a clinical observation. But of the two of you, only Yoongi is calm. His face gets warmer though; it radiates that honey glow, calming your nerves a little.

"You wanna date?"

"Yeah. Whatever. If you want to".

You rub your eye. Yoongi rakes his hair, then dimples his chin. His brown sweatshirt belonged to him since he bought it, but you remember helping him choose.

"Okay", he says finally, "but I will tease you about it forever".

As he says it, he bobs his head accusingly. Then something kicks you gently under the table. You look down and see his hand. You take it. He must feel the change in your touch, because he squeezes your palm, one corner of his mouth smiling. Honey boy. What's worse is, you always had a thing for him, too. Just a different thing, deeper. Something that needed to be undug.

taglist: @mar-lo-pap

#yoongi x reader #yoongi x y/n #yoongi imagine #bts imagine #yoongi fluff

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spikedfearn · 2 months ago

Text

Mercy Made Flesh

one-shot

Remmick x fem!reader

summary: In the heat-choked hush of the Mississippi Delta, you answer a knock you swore would never come. Remmick—unaging, unholy, unforgettable—returns to collect what was promised. What follows is not romance, but ritual. A slow, sensual surrender to a hunger older than the Trinity itself.

wc: 13.1k

a/n: Listen. I didn’t mean to simp for Vampire Jack O’Connell—but here we are. I make no apologies for letting Remmick bite first and ask questions never. Thank you to my bestie Nat (@kayharrisons) for beta reading and hyping me up, without her this fic wouldn't exist, everyone say thank you Nat!

warnings: vampirism, southern gothic erotica, blood drinking as intimacy, canon-typical violence, explicit sexual content, oral sex (f!receiving), first time, bloodplay, biting, marking, monsterfucking (soft edition), religious imagery, devotion as obsession, gothic horror vibes, worship kink, consent affirmed, begging, dirty talk, gentle ruin, haunting eroticism, power imbalance, slow seduction, soul-binding, immortal x mortal, he wants to keep her forever, she lets him, fem!reader, second person pov, 1930s mississippi delta, house that breathes, you will be fed upon emotionally & literally

tags: @xhoneymoonx134

likes, comments, and reblogs appreciated! please enjoy

Mississippi Delta, 1938

The heat hadn’t broken in days.

Not even after sunset, when the sky turned the color of old bruises and the crickets started singing like they were being paid to. It was the kind of heat that soaked into the floorboards, that crept beneath your thin cotton slip and clung to your back like sweat-slicked hands. The air was syrupy, heavy with magnolia and something murkier—soil, maybe. River water. Something that made you itch beneath your skin.

Your cottage sat just outside the edge of town, past the schoolhouse where you spent your days sorting through ledgers and lesson plans that no one but you ever really seemed to care about. It was modest—two rooms and a porch, set back behind a crumbling white-picket fence and swallowed by trees that whispered in the dark. A little sanctuary tucked into the Delta, surrounded by cornfields, creeks, and ghosts.

The kind of place a person could disappear if they wanted to. The kind of place someone could find you…if they were patient enough.

You stood in front of the sink, rinsing out a chipped enamel cup, your hands moving automatically. The oil lamp on the kitchen table flickered with each breath of wind slipping through the cracks in the warped window frame. A cicada screamed in the distance, then another, and then the whole world was humming in chorus.

And beneath it—beneath the cicadas, and the wind, and the nightbirds—you felt something shift.

A quiet. Too quiet.

You turned your head. Listened harder.

Nothing.

Not even the frogs.

Your hand paused in the dishwater. Fingers trembling just a little. It wasn’t like you to be spooked by the dark. You’d grown up in it. Learned to make friends with shadows. Learned not to flinch when things moved just out of sight.

But this?

This was different.

It was as if the night was holding its breath.

And then—

Knock. Knock. Knock.

Not loud. Not frantic. But final.

Your body went stiff. The cup slipped beneath the water and bumped the side of the basin with a hollow clink.

No one ever came this far out after sundown. No one but—

You shook your head, almost hard enough to rattle something loose.

No.

He was gone. That part of your life was buried.

You made sure of it.

Still, your bare feet moved toward the door like they weren’t yours. Soft against the creaky wood. Slow. You reached for the small revolver you kept in the drawer beside the door frame, thumbed the hammer back.

Your hand rested on the knob.

Another knock. This time, softer.

Almost...polite.

The porch light had been dead for weeks, so you couldn’t see who was waiting on the other side. But the air—something in the air—told you.

It was him.

You didn’t answer. Not right away.

You stood there with your palm flat against the rough wood, your forehead nearly touching it too—eyes shut, breath shallow. The air on the other side didn’t stir like it should’ve. No footfalls creaking the porch. No shuffle of boots on sun-bleached planks. Just stillness. Waiting.

And underneath your ribs, something began to ache. Something you hadn’t let yourself feel in years.

You didn’t know his name, not back then. You only knew his eyes—gold in the shadows. Red when caught in the light. Like a firelight in the dark. Like a blood red moon through stained-glass windows.

And his voice. Low. Dragging vowels like syrup. A Southern accent that didn’t come from any map you’d ever seen—older than towns, older than state lines. A voice that had told you, seven years ago, with impossible calm:

"You’ll know when it’s time."

You knew. Your hands trembled against your sides. But you didn’t back away. Some part of you knew how useless running would be.

The knob beneath your hand felt cold. Too cold for Mississippi in August.

You turned it.

The door opened slow, hinges whining like they were trying to warn you. You stepped back instinctively—just one step—and then he was there.

Remmick.

Still tall, still lean in that devastating way—like his body was carved from something hard and mean, but shaped to tempt. He wore a crisp white shirt rolled to the elbows, suspenders hanging loose from his hips, and trousers that looked far too clean for a man who walked through the dirt. His hair was messy in that intentional way, brown and swept back like he’d been running hands through it all night. Stubble lined his sharp jaw, catching the lamplight just so.

But it was his face that rooted you to the floor. That hollowed out your breath.

Still young. Still wrong.

Not a wrinkle, not a scar. Not a mark of time. He hadn’t aged a day.

And his eyes—oh, God, his eyes.

They caught the lamp behind you and lit up red, bright and glinting, like the embers of a dying fire. Not human. Not even pretending.

"Hello, dove."

His voice curled into your bones like cigarette smoke. You didn’t answer. You couldn’t.

You hated how your body reacted.

Hated that you could still feel it—like something old and molten stirring between your thighs, a flicker of the same heat you’d felt that night in the alley, back when you were too desperate to care what kind of creature answered your prayer.

He looked you over once. Not with hunger. With certainty. Like he already knew how this would end. Like he already owned you.

"You remember, don’t you?" he asked.

"I came to collect."

And your voice—when it finally came—was little more than a whisper.

"You can’t be real."

That smile. That slight twitch at the corner of his mouth. Wolfish. Slow.

"You promised."

You wanted to shut the door. Slam it. Deadbolt it. But your hand didn’t move.

Remmick didn’t step forward, not yet. He stood just outside the threshold, framed by night and cypress trees and the distant flicker of heat lightning beyond the fields. The air around him pulsed with something old—older than the land, older than you, older than anything you could name.

He tilted his head the way animals do, watching you, letting the silence thicken like molasses between you.

"Still living out here all on your own," he murmured, gaze drifting over your shoulders, into the small, tidy kitchen behind you. "Hung your laundry on the line this morning. Blue dress, lace hem. Favorite one, ain’t it?"

Your stomach clenched. That dress hadn’t seen a neighbor’s eye all week.

"You've been watching me," you said, your voice low, unsure if it was accusation or realization.

"I’ve been waiting," he said. "Not the same thing."

You swallowed hard. Your breath caught in your throat like a thorn. The wind shifted, and you caught the faintest trace of something—dried tobacco, smoke, rain-soaked dirt, and beneath it, the iron-sweet tinge of blood.

Not fresh. Not violent. Just…present. Like it lived in him.

"I paid my debt," you whispered.

"No, you survived it," he said, stepping up onto the first board of the porch. The wood didn’t creak beneath his weight. "And that’s only half the bargain."

He still hadn’t crossed the threshold.

The stories came back to you, the ones whispered by old women with trembling hands and ash crosses pressed to their doorways—vampires couldn’t enter unless invited. But you hadn’t invited him, not this time.

"You don’t have permission," you said.

He smiled, eyes flashing red again.

"You gave it, seven years ago."

Your breath hitched.

"I was a girl," you said.

"You were desperate," he corrected. "And honest. Desperation makes people honest in ways they can’t be twice. You knew what you were offering me, even if you didn’t understand it. Your promise had teeth."

The wind pushed against your back, as if urging you forward.

Remmick stepped closer, just enough for the shadows to kiss the line of his throat, the hollow of his collarbone. His voice dropped, intimate now—dragging across your skin like a fingertip behind the ear.

"You asked for a miracle. I gave it to you. And now I’m here for what’s mine."

Your heart thudded violently in your chest.

"I didn’t think you’d come."

"That’s the thing about monsters, dove." He leaned down, lips almost grazing the curve of your jaw. "We always do."

And then—

He stepped back.

The wind stopped.

The night fell quiet again, like the world had paused just to watch what you’d do next.

"I’ll wait out here till you’re ready," he said, turning toward the swing on your porch and settling into it like he had all the time in the world. "But don’t make me knock twice. Wouldn’t be polite."

The swing groaned beneath him as it rocked gently, back and forth.

You stood there frozen in the doorway, one bare foot still inside the house, the other brushing the edge of the porch.

You’d made a promise.

And he was here to keep it.

The door stayed open. Just enough for the night to reach inside.

You didn’t move.

Your body stood still but your mind wandered—back to that night in the alley, to the smell of blood and piss and riverwater, your knees soaked in your brother’s lifeblood as you screamed for help that never came. Except it did. It came in the shape of a man who didn’t breathe, didn’t blink, didn’t make promises the way mortals did.

It came in the shape of him.

You thought time would wash it away. That the years would smooth the edges of his voice in your memory, dull the sharpness of his presence. But now, with him just outside your door, it all returned like a fever dream—hot, all-consuming, too real to outrun.

You turned away from the threshold, slowly, carefully, as if the floor might cave in under you. Your hands trembled as you reached for the oil lamp on the table, adjusting the flame lower until it flickered like a dying heartbeat.

The silence behind you dragged, deep and waiting. He didn’t speak again. Didn’t call for you.

He didn’t have to.

You moved through the house in slow circles. Touching things. Straightening them. Folding a dishcloth. Setting a book back on the shelf, even though you’d already read it twice. You tried to pretend you weren’t thinking about the man on your porch. But the heat of him pressed against the back of your mind like a hand.

You could feel him out there. Not just physically—but in you, somehow. Like the air had shifted around his shape, and the longer he lingered, the more your body remembered what it had felt like to stand in front of something not quite human and still want.

You passed the mirror in the hallway and paused.

Your reflection looked undone. Not in the way your hair had fallen from its pin, or the flush across your cheeks, but deeper—like something inside you had been cracked open. You touched your own throat, right where you imagined his mouth might go.

No bite.

Not yet.

But you swore you could feel phantom teeth.

You went back to the door, holding your breath, and looked at him through the screen.

He hadn’t moved. He sat on the swing, one leg stretched out, the other bent lazily beneath him, arms slung across the backrest like he’d always belonged there. A cigarette burned between two fingers, the tip flaring orange as he dragged from it. The scent of it hit you—rich, earthy, and somehow foreign, like something imported from a place no longer on the map.

He didn’t look at you right away.

Then, slowly, he did.

Red eyes caught yours.

He smiled, small and slow, like he was reading a page of you he’d already memorized.

"Thought you’d shut the door by now," he said.

"I should have," you answered.

"But you didn’t."

His voice curled into the quiet.

You stepped out onto the porch, barefoot, the boards warm beneath your soles. He didn’t move to greet you. He didn’t rise. He just watched you walk toward him like he’d been watching in dreams you never remembered having.

The swing groaned as you sat down beside him, a careful space between you.

His shoulder brushed yours.

You stared straight ahead, out into the night. A mist was beginning to rise off the distant fields. The moon hung low and orange like a wound in the sky.

Somewhere in the bayou, a whippoorwill called, long and mournful.

"How long have you been watching me?" you asked.

"Since before you knew to look."

"Why now?"

He turned toward you. His voice was velvet-wrapped iron.

"Because now…you’re ripe for the pickin’.”

You didn’t remember falling asleep.

One moment you were on the porch beside him, listening to the slow groan of the swing and the way the crickets held their breath when he exhaled, the next you were waking in your bed, the sheets tangled around your legs like they were trying to hold you down.

The house was too quiet.

No birdsong. No creak of the windmill out back. No rustle of the sycamores that scraped against your bedroom window on stormy nights.

Just stillness.

And scent.

It clung to the cotton of your nightdress. Tobacco smoke, sweat, rain. Him.

You sat up slowly, pressing your hand to your chest. Your heart thudded like it was trying to remember who it belonged to. The lamp beside your bed had burned down to a stub. A trickle of wax curled like a vein down the side of the glass.

Your mouth tasted like smoke and guilt. Your thighs ached in that low, humming way—though you couldn’t say why. Nothing had happened. Not really.

But something had changed.

You felt it under your skin, in the place where blood meets breath.

The floor was cool under your feet as you moved. You didn’t dress. Just pulled a robe over your slip and stepped into the hallway. The house felt heavier than usual, thick with the ghost of his presence. Every corner held a whisper. Every shadow a shape.

You opened the front door.

The porch was empty.

The swing still rocked gently, as if someone had only just stood up from it.

A folded piece of paper lay on the top step, weighted down by a smooth river stone.

You picked it up with trembling hands.

Come.

That was all it said. One word. But it rang through your bones like gospel. Like a vow.

You looked out across the field. A narrow dirt road stretched beyond the tree line, overgrown but clear. You’d never dared follow it. That road didn’t belong to you.

It belonged to him.

And now…so did you.

You didn’t bring anything with you.

Not a suitcase. Not a shawl. Not a Bible tucked under your arm for comfort.

Just yourself.

And the road.

The hem of your slip was already damp by the time you reached the edge of the field. Dew clung to your ankles like cold fingers, and the earth was soft beneath your feet—fresh from last night’s storm, the kind that never really breaks the heat, only deepens it. The moon had gone down, but the sky was beginning to bruise with that blue-black ink that comes before sunrise. Everything smelled like wet grass, magnolia, and the faint rot of old wood.

The path curved, narrowing as it passed through trees that leaned in too close. Their branches kissed above you like they were whispering secrets into each other’s leaves. Spanish moss hung like veils from the oaks, dripping silver in the fading dark. It made the world feel smaller. Quieter. As if you were walking into something sacred—or something doomed.

A crow cawed once in the distance. Sharp. Hollow. You didn’t flinch.

There was no sound of wheels. No car waiting. Just the road and the fog and the promise you'd made.

And then you saw it.

The house.

Tucked deep in the grove, half-swallowed by vines and time, it rose like a memory from the earth. A decaying plantation, left to rot in the wet belly of the Delta. Its bones were still beautiful—white columns streaked with black mildew, a grand porch that sagged like a mouth missing teeth, shuttered windows with iron latches rusted shut. Ivy grew up the sides like it was trying to strangle the place. Or maybe protect it.

You stood there at the edge of the clearing, breath caught in your throat.

He’d brought you here.

Or maybe he’d always been here. Waiting. Dreaming of the moment you’d return to him without even knowing it.

A shape moved behind one of the upstairs curtains. Quick. Barely there.

You didn’t run.

Your bare foot found the first step.

It groaned like it recognized you.

The door was already open.

Not wide—just enough for you to know it had been waiting.

And you stepped inside.

The air inside was colder.

Not the kind of cold that came from breeze or shade—but from stillness, from the absence of sun and time. A hush so thick it felt like you were walking underwater. Like the house had held its breath for decades and only now began to exhale.

Dust spiraled in the faint light seeping through fractured windows, casting soft halos through the dark. The wooden floor beneath your feet was warped and groaning, but clean. Not in any natural sense—there was no broom that had touched these boards. No polish or soap.

But it had been kept.

The air didn’t smell like rot or mildew. It smelled like cedar. Like old leather. And deeper beneath that, like him.

He hadn’t lit any lamps.

Just the fireplace, burning low, glowing embers pulsing orange-red at the back of a cavernous hearth. The flame danced shadows across the faded wallpaper, peeling in long strips like dead skin. A high-backed chair faced the fire, velvet blackened from age, its silhouette looming like something alive.

You swallowed, lips dry, and stepped further in.

Your voice didn’t carry. It didn’t even try.

Remmick was nowhere in sight.

But he was here.

You could feel him in the walls, in the way the house seemed to lean closer with every step you took.

You passed through the parlor, past a dusty grand piano with one ivory key cracked down the middle. Past oil portraits too old to make out, their eyes blurred with time. Past a single vase of dried wildflowers, colorless now, but carefully arranged.

You paused in the doorway to the drawing room, your hand resting lightly on the frame.

A whisper of air moved behind you.

Then—

A hand.

Not grabbing. Not harsh. Just the light press of fingers against the small of your back, palm flat and warm through the thin cotton of your slip.

You froze.

He was behind you.

So close you could feel his breath at your neck. Not warm, not cold—just present. Like wind through a crack in the door. Like the memory of a touch before it lands.

His voice was low, close to your ear.

"You came."

You didn’t answer.

"You always would have."

You wanted to say no. Wanted to deny it. But you stood there trembling under his hand, your heartbeat so loud you were sure he could hear it.

Maybe that was why he smiled.

He stepped around you slowly, letting his fingers graze the side of your waist as he moved. His eyes glinted red in the firelight, catching on you like a flame drawn to dry kindling.

He looked at you like he was already undressing you.

Not your clothes—your will.

And it was already unraveling.

You’d suspected he wasn’t born of this soil.

Not just because of the way he moved—like he didn’t quite belong to gravity—but because of the way he spoke. Like time hadn’t worn the edges off his words the way it had with everyone else. His voice curled around vowels like smoke curling through keyholes. Rich and low, but laced with something older. Something foreign. Something that made the hair at the nape of your neck rise when he spoke too softly, too close.

He didn’t speak like a man from the Delta.

He spoke like something older than it.

Older than the country. Maybe older than God.

Remmick stopped in front of you, lit only by firelight.

His eyes had dulled from red to something deeper—like old garnet held to a candle. His shirt was open at the collar now, suspenders hanging slack, the buttons on his sleeves rolled to his elbows. His forearms were dusted with faint scars that looked like they had stories. His skin was pale in the glow, but not lifeless. He looked like marble warmed by touch.

He studied you for a long time.

You weren’t sure if it was your face he was reading, or something beneath it. Something you couldn’t hide.

"You look just like your mother," he said finally.

Your breath caught.

"You knew her?"

A soft smirk curled at the corner of his mouth.

"I’ve known a lot of people, dove. I just never forget the ones with your blood."

You didn’t ask what he meant. Not yet.

There was something heavy in his tone—something laced with memory that stretched back far further than it should. You had guessed, years ago, in the sleepless weeks after that alleyway miracle, that he was not new to this world. That his youth was a trick of the skin. A lie worn like a mask.

You’d read every folklore book you could get your hands on. Every whisper of vampire lore scratched into the margins of ledgers, stuffed between church hymnals, scribbled on the backs of newspapers.

Some said they aged. Slowly. Elegantly.

Others said they didn’t age at all. That they existed outside time. Beyond it.

You didn’t know how old Remmick was.

But something in your bones told you the truth.

Five hundred. Six hundred, maybe more.

A man who remembered empires. A man who had watched cities rise and burn. Who had danced in plague-slick ballrooms and kissed queens before they were beheaded. A man who had lived so long that names no longer mattered. Only debts. And blood.

And you’d given him both.

He stepped closer now, slow and deliberate.

"Yer heart’s gallopin’ like it thinks I’m here to take it."

You flinched. Not because he was wrong. But because he was right.

"You said you didn’t want my blood," you whispered.

"I don’t." He tilted his head. "Not yet."

"Then what do you want?"

His smile didn’t reach his eyes.

"You."

He said it like it was a simple thing. Like the rain wanting the river. Like the grave wanting the body.

You swallowed hard.

"Why me?"

His gaze dragged down your frame, unhurried, like a man admiring a painting he’d stolen once and hidden from the world.

"Because you belong to me. You gave yourself freely. No bargain’s ever tasted so sweet."

Your throat tightened.

"I didn’t know what I was agreeing to."

"You did," he said, softly now, stepping close enough that his chest nearly brushed yours. "You knew. Your soul knew. Even if your head didn’t catch up."

You opened your mouth to protest, to say something, anything that would push back this slow suffocation of certainty—

But his hand came up to your jaw. Fingers feather-light. Not forcing. Just holding. Just there.

"And you’ve been thinkin’ about me ever since," he said.

Not a question. A statement.

You didn’t answer.

He leaned in, his breath ghosting over your cheek, his voice a rasp against your ear.

"You dream of me, don’t you?"

Your hands trembled at your sides.

"I don’t—"

"You wake wet. Ache in your belly. You don’t know why. But I do."

You let your eyes fall shut, shame burning behind them like fire.

"Fuckin’ knew it," he murmured, almost reverent. "You smell like want, dove. You always have.”

His hand didn’t move. It just stayed there at your jaw, thumb ghosting slow along the hollow beneath your cheekbone. A touch so gentle it made your knees ache. Because it wasn’t the roughness that undid you—it was the restraint.

He could’ve taken.

He didn’t.

Not yet.

His gaze held yours, slow and unblinking, red still smoldering in the center of his irises like the dying core of a flame that refused to go out.

"Say it," he murmured.

Your lips parted, but nothing came.

"I can smell it," he said, voice low, rich as molasses. "Your shame. Your want. You’ve been livin’ like a nun with a beast inside her, and no one knows but me."

You hated how your breath stuttered. Hated more that your thighs pressed together when he said it.

"Why do you talk like that," you whispered, barely able to get the words out, "like you already know what I’m feeling?"

His fingers slid down, grazing the side of your neck, stopping just before the pulse thudding there.

"Because I do."

"That’s not fair."

He smiled, slow and crooked, nothing kind in it.

"No, dove. It ain’t."

You hated him.

You hated how beautiful he was in this light, sleeves rolled, veins prominent in his arms, shirt hanging open just enough to show the faint line of a scar that trailed beneath his collarbone. A body shaped by time, not by vanity. Not perfect. Just true. Like someone carved him for a purpose and let the flaws stay because they made him real.

He looked like sin and the sermon that came after.

Remmick moved closer. You didn’t retreat.

His hand flattened over your sternum now, right above your heartbeat, the warmth of him pressing through the cotton of your slip like it meant to seep in. He leaned down, mouth near yours, not kissing, just breathing.

"You gave yourself to me once," he said. "I’m only here to collect the rest."

"You saved my brother."

"I saved you. You just didn’t know it yet."

A shiver rippled down your spine.

His hand moved lower, skimming the curve of your ribs, hovering just at the soft flare of your waist. You could feel the heat rolling off him like smoke from a coalbed. His body didn’t radiate warmth the way a man’s should—but something older. Wilder. Like the earth’s own breath in summer. Like the hush of a storm right before it split the sky.

"And if I tell you no?" you asked, barely more than a breath.

His eyes flicked to yours, unreadable.

"I’ll wait."

You weren’t expecting that.

He smiled again, this time softer, almost cruel in its patience.

"I’ve waited centuries for sweeter things than you. But that don’t mean I won’t keep my hands on you ‘til you change your mind."

"You think I will?"

"You already have."

Your chest rose sharply, breath stung with heat.

"You think this is love?"

He laughed, low and dangerous, the sound curling around your ribs.

"No," he said. "This is hunger. Love comes later."

Then his mouth brushed your jaw—not a kiss, just the graze of lips against skin—and every nerve in your body arched to meet it.

Your knees buckled, barely.

He caught your waist in one hand, steadying you with maddening ease.

"I’m gonna ruin you," he whispered against your throat, his nose dragging lightly along your skin. "But I’ll be so gentle the first time you’ll beg me to do it again."

And God help you—

You wanted him to.

The house didn’t sleep.

Not the way houses were meant to.

It breathed.

The walls exhaled heat and memory, the floors creaked even when no one stepped, and somewhere in the rafters above your room, something paced slowly back and forth, back and forth, like a beast too restless to settle. The kind of place built with its own pulse.

You’d spent the rest of the night—if you could call it that—in a room that wasn’t yours, wearing nothing but a cotton shift and your silence. You hadn’t asked for anything. He hadn’t offered.

The room was spare but not cruel. A basin with a water pitcher. A four-poster bed draped in a netting veil to keep out the bugs—or the ghosts. The mattress was soft. The sheets smelled faintly of cedar, firewood, and something else you didn’t recognize.

Him.

You didn’t undress. You lay on top of the blanket, fingers threaded together over your belly, the thrum of your heartbeat like a second mouth behind your ribs.

Your door had no lock. Just a handle that squeaked if turned. And you hated how many times your eyes flicked toward it. Waiting. Wanting.

But he never came.

And somehow, that was worse.

Morning broke soft and gray through the slatted shutters. The sun didn’t quite reach the corners of the room, and the light that filtered in was the color of dust and river fog.

When you finally stepped out barefoot into the hall, the house was already awake.

There was a scent in the air—coffee. Burned sugar. The faintest curl of cinnamon. Something sizzling in a skillet somewhere.

You followed it.

The kitchen was enormous, all brick hearth and cast iron and a long scarred table in the center with mismatched chairs pushed in unevenly. A window hung open, letting in a breath of swamp air that rustled the lace curtain and kissed your ankles.

Remmick stood at the stove with his back to you, sleeves still rolled to the elbow, suspenders crossed low over his back. His shirt was half-unbuttoned and clung to his sides with the cling of heat and skin. He moved like he didn’t hear you enter.

You knew he had.

He reached for the pan with a towel over his palm and flipped something in the cast iron with a deft flick of the wrist.

"Hope you like sweet," he said, voice thick with morning. "Ain’t got much else."

You didn’t speak. Just stood there in the doorway like a ghost he’d conjured and forgotten about.

He turned.

God help you.

Even like this, barefoot, collar open, hair mussed from sleep or maybe just time—he looked unreal. Like a sin someone had tried to scrub out of scripture but couldn’t quite forget.

"Sleep alright?" he asked.

You gave a small nod.

He looked at you a moment longer. Then—

"Sit down, dove."

You moved toward the table.

His voice followed you, lazy but pointed.

"That’s the wrong chair."

You paused.

He nodded to one at the head of the table—old, high-backed, carved with curling vines and symbols you didn’t recognize.

"That one’s yours now."

You hesitated, then lowered yourself into it slowly. The wood groaned under your weight. The air in the kitchen felt thicker now, tighter.

He brought the plate to you himself.

Two slices of skillet cornbread, golden and glistening with syrup. A few wild strawberries sliced and sugared. A smear of butter melting slow at the center like a pulse.

He set the plate in front of you with a quiet care that felt almost obscene.

"You ain’t gotta eat," he said, leaning against the table beside your chair. "But I like watchin’ you do it."

You picked up the fork.

His eyes stayed on your mouth.

The cornbread was still warm.

Steam curled from it like breath from parted lips. The syrup pooled thick at the edges, dripping off the edge of your fork in slow, amber ribbons. It stuck to your fingers when you touched it. Sweet. Sticky. Sensual.

You brought the first bite to your mouth, slow.

Remmick didn’t speak. He didn’t need to. His eyes tracked the motion like a starving man watching someone else’s feast.

The bite landed soft on your tongue—golden crisp on the outside, warm and tender in the middle, butter melting into every pore. It was perfect. Unreasonably so. And somehow you hated that even more. Because nothing about this should’ve tasted good. Not with him watching you like that. Not with your body still humming from the memory of his voice against your skin.

But you swallowed.

And he smiled.

"Good girl," he murmured.

You froze. The fork paused just above the plate.

"You don’t get to say things like that," you whispered.

"Why not?"

Your fingers tightened around the handle.

"Because it sounds like you earned it."

He chuckled, low and easy. A slow roll of thunder in his chest.

"Think I did. Think I earned every fuckin’ word after draggin’ you out that night and lettin’ you walk away without layin’ a hand on you."

You looked up sharply, heat crawling up your neck.

"You shouldn’t have touched me."

"I didn’t," he said. "But I wanted to. Still do."

Your breath caught.

His knuckles brushed the edge of your plate, slow, casual, like he had all the time in the world to make you squirm.

"And I know you want me to," he added, voice low enough that it coiled under your ribs and settled somewhere molten in your belly.

You pushed the plate away.

He didn’t flinch. Just reached forward and dragged it back in front of you like you hadn’t moved it at all.

"You eat," he said, gentler now. "You need it. House takes more from you than it gives."

You glanced around the kitchen, suddenly uneasy.

"You talk about it like it’s alive."

He gave a slow nod.

"It is. In a way."

"How?"

He looked down at your plate, then back at you.

"You’ll see."

You pushed another bite past your lips, slower this time, aware of the weight of his gaze with every chew, every swallow. You didn’t know why you obeyed. Maybe it was easier than defying him. Maybe it was because some part of you wanted him to keep watching.

When the plate was clean, he reached out and caught your wrist before you could stand.

Not hard. Not even firm. Just…inevitable.

"You full?" he asked, his voice all smoke and sin.

You nodded.

His eyes darkened.

"Then I’ll have my taste next."

Your breath lodged sharp in your throat.

He said it like it meant nothing. Like asking for your pulse was no more intimate than asking for your hand. But there was a glint in his eye—red barely flickering now, but still there—and it told you everything.

He was done pretending.

You didn’t move. Not right away.

His fingers were still wrapped around your wrist, light but unyielding, the pad of his thumb grazing the fragile skin where your pulse drummed loud and frantic. Like it wanted to leap out of your veins and spill into his mouth.

You swallowed hard.

"You said you didn’t want blood."

"I don’t."

"Then what do you want?"

"You."

You watched him now, trying to make sense of what you wanted.

And what terrified you was this—

You didn’t want to run.

You wanted to know how it would feel.

To give something he couldn’t take without permission.

To see if your body could handle the worship of a mouth like his.

Remmick’s other hand came up slow, brushing hair from your cheek, his knuckles rough and reverent.

"You said I smelled like want," you whispered.

"You do."

"What do you smell like?"

He leaned in, mouth near your throat again, his nose dragging along your skin, slow, as if he were drawing in the scent of your soul.

"Rot. Hunger. Regret," he said. "Old things that don’t die right."

You shivered.

"And still I want you," you breathed.

He pulled back just enough to look you in the eyes.

"That’s the worst part, ain’t it?"

You didn’t answer.

Because he was right.

His hand slid down to your elbow, then lower, tracing the curve of your waist through the thin fabric. His touch was warm now, or maybe your body had just given up trying to tell the difference between threat and thrill.

He guided you up from the chair.

Didn’t yank. Didn’t drag.

Just stood and took your hand like a dance was beginning.

"Come with me," he said.

"Where?"

"Somewhere I can kneel."

Your heart stuttered.

He led you through the house, down the long hallway past doorways that watched like eyes. The floor groaned underfoot, the air thickening around your shoulders as he brought you deeper into the home’s belly. You passed portraits whose paint had faded to shadows, velvet drapes drawn tight, mirrors that refused to hold your reflection quite right.

The door at the end of the hall was already open.

Inside, the room was dark.

Just one candle lit, flickering low in a glass jar, its light catching the edges of something silver beside the bed. An old bowl. A cloth. A pair of gloves, yellowed from time.

A ritual.

Not violent.

Intimate.

Remmick turned toward you, his face bare in the soft light. He looked younger. More human. And somehow more dangerous for it.

"Sit," he said.

You sat.

He knelt.

And then his hands found your knees.

His hands rested on your knees like they belonged there. Not demanding. Not prying. Just there. Anchored. Reverent.

The candlelight licked up his jaw, catching in the hollows of his cheeks, the deep shadow beneath his throat. He didn’t look like a man. He looked like a story told by firelight—half-worshipped, half-feared. A sinner in the shape of a saint. Or maybe the other way around.

His thumbs made a slow pass over the inside of your thighs, just above the knee. Barely pressure. Barely touch. The kind of contact that made your breath feel too loud in your chest.

"Yer too quiet," he murmured.

"I don’t know what to say," you whispered back.

His gaze lifted, locking with yours, and in that moment the whole room seemed to still.

"Ya ain’t gotta say a damn thing," he said. "You just need to stay right there and let me show ya what I mean when I say I don’t want yer blood."

Your lips parted, but no sound came.

He leaned in, slow as honey in the heat, until his mouth hovered just above your knee. Then lower. His breath ghosted over your skin, warm and maddening.

You didn’t realize you were holding your breath until he pressed a single kiss just above the bone.

Your lungs stuttered.

His lips trailed higher.

Another kiss.

Then another.

Each one higher than the last, until your legs opened on instinct, until you felt the hem of your slip being eased upward by hands that moved with worshipful patience. Like he wasn’t just undressing you—he was peeling back a veil. Unwrapping something sacred.

"You ever had someone kneel for ya?" he asked, voice rough now. Thicker.

You shook your head.

He smiled like he already knew the answer.

"Good. Let me be the first."

He kissed the inside of your thigh like it meant something. Like you meant something. Like your skin wasn’t just skin, but a prayer he intended to answer with his mouth.

The air was too hot. Your thoughts slid loose from the edges of your mind. All you could do was breathe and feel.

He looked up at you once more, red eyes burning low, and said—

"You gave yerself to me. Let me taste what I already own."

And then he bowed his head, mouth meeting the softest part of you, and the rest of the world disappeared.

His mouth touched you like he’d been dreaming of it for years. Like he’d earned it.

No rush. No hunger. Just that first velvet press of his lips against the tender center of you, reverent and slow, like a kiss to a wound or a confession. He moaned, low and guttural, into your skin—and the sound of it vibrated up through your spine.

He parted you with his thumbs, just enough to taste you deeper. His tongue slipped between folds already slick and aching, and he groaned again, this time with something like gratitude.

"Sweet as I fuckin’ knew you’d be," he rasped, voice hot against your core.

Your hands gripped the edge of the chair. Wood bit into your palms. Your head tipped back, eyes fluttering shut as your thighs trembled around his shoulders.

He didn’t stop.

He licked you with patience, with purpose, like he was reading scripture written between your legs—each flick of his tongue slow and deliberate, every pass perfectly placed, building pressure inside you with maddening precision.

And all the while, he watched you.

When your head dropped forward, you found him staring up at you. Red eyes glowing low, heavy-lidded, mouth glistening, jaw tense with restraint. He looked ruined by the taste of you.

"Look at me," he said. "Wanna see you fall apart on my tongue."

Your breath hitched, hips rocking forward on instinct, chasing his mouth. He growled low and deep in his chest, gripping your thighs tighter.

"That’s it, dove," he murmured. "Don’t run from it. Give it to me."

He flattened his tongue and dragged it slow, then circled the swollen peak of your clit with the tip, teasing you to the edge and pulling back just before it broke.

You whined. Desperate.

He smirked against your cunt.

"You want it?" he asked, voice thick. "Say it."

Your lips barely formed the word—"Please."

He hummed in approval.

Then he devoured you.

No more teasing. No more pacing. Just his mouth fully locked on you, tongue relentless now, lips sealing around your clit while two fingers slid into you with that obscene, perfect pressure that made your body jolt.

You cried out, gasping, your thighs tightening around his head as the world tipped sideways.

"That’s it," he groaned, curling his fingers just right. "Cum f’r me, girl. Let me taste what’s mine."

And when it hit—

It hit like a fever. Like lightning. Like your soul cracked in half and bled straight into his mouth.

You broke with a cry, hips bucking, your fingers tangled in his hair as wave after wave crashed through you.

He didn’t stop. Not until your thighs twitched and your breath came in ragged little sobs, not until your body went limp in his hands.

Then, finally—finally—he pulled back.

His lips were wet. His eyes were feral. And he looked at you like a man who’d just fed.

"You’re fuckin’ divine," he whispered. "And I ain’t even started ruinin’ you yet."

The room pulsed with quiet. The candle flickered low, flame swaying as if it too had held its breath through your unraveling.

Your body felt boneless. Glazed in sweat. Your pulse echoed everywhere—in your wrists, your throat, between your legs where he’d buried his mouth like a man sent to worship. You weren’t sure how long it had been since you’d spoken. Since you’d breathed without shaking.

Remmick still knelt.

His hands were on your thighs, thumbs drawing idle circles into your skin like he couldn’t bear to stop touching you. His head was bowed slightly, but his eyes were on you—watchful, reverent, hungry in a way that had nothing to do with the softness between your legs and everything to do with something older. Something darker.

He looked drunk on you.

You opened your mouth to speak, but your voice caught on the edge of a sigh.

He beat you to it.

"Reckon you know what’s comin’ next," he murmured.

You didn’t answer.

He rose from his knees in one slow, unhurried motion. There was a heaviness to him now, a tension rolling just beneath his skin, like a dam about to split. He reached up with one hand and wiped the corner of his mouth with the back of it—then licked the taste from his thumb like it was honey off the comb.

You watched, breath held tight in your chest.

He stepped closer. You stayed seated, knees still parted, your slip pushed up indecently high, but you didn’t fix it. Didn’t move at all. The heat between your legs hadn’t faded. If anything, it curled deeper now, thicker, laced with something close to fear but not quite.

He stopped in front of you.

Tilted his head slightly.

"How’s yer heart?"

You blinked.

"It’s…fast," you whispered.

He smiled slow. Not mocking. Not soft either.

"Good. I want it fast."

Your throat tightened.

"Why?"

He leaned in, hands bracing on either side of your chair, body boxing you in without touching.

"‘Cause I want yer blood screamin’ for me when I take it."

Your breath caught somewhere between your ribs.

He didn’t touch you yet—didn’t need to. The weight of his body, caging you in without a single finger laid, made your skin flush from your chest to your knees. Every inch of you throbbed with awareness. Of him. Of your own pulse. Of the air cooling the places he’d worshiped with his mouth not moments before.

You swallowed.

"You said you’d wait," you whispered.

He nodded once, slowly, his eyes never leaving yours.

"I did. And I have. But yer body’s already beggin’ for me. Ain’t it?"

You hated that he was right. That he could feel it somehow. Not just see the tremble in your thighs or the way your lips parted when he leaned closer—but that he could feel it in the air, like scent, like vibration.

You lifted your chin, barely.

"I’m not scared."

He chuckled low, and it rumbled through your bones.

"Good. But I don’t need ya scared, dove. I need ya open."

He raised one hand then, slow as scripture, and brushed his knuckles along the column of your throat. Just a whisper of contact, a ghost’s touch. Your head tilted for him without thinking, baring your neck.

"Right here," he murmured. "Right where it beats loudest. That’s where I wanna taste ya."

You shivered.

He bent down, mouth near your pulse. His breath was warm, slow, drawn in like he was savoring you already.

"I ain’t gonna hurt ya," he said. "Not unless you want it."

Your fingers twisted in your lap.

"Will it—" you started, but the question got tangled.

He smiled against your skin.

"Will it feel good?"

You said nothing.

"You already know."

You did.

Because everything with him did. Every word. Every look. Every touch. It wasn’t right. It wasn’t holy. But it was real. It lived under your skin like rot and root and ruin.

You nodded once.

"Then take it."

Remmick stilled.

And then his lips pressed to your throat. Not with hunger. With reverence. Like a blessing.

"That’s my girl," he breathed.

And then he bit.

It wasn’t pain.

It was pressure, first.

A deep, aching pull that bloomed just beneath the skin, right where his mouth latched onto you. His lips sealed tight around your throat, and then—sharpness. Two points sinking in like teeth through silk. Like sin through flesh.

You gasped.

Not from fear. Not even from the sting. But from the rush.

Heat burst behind your eyes, white and sudden and dizzying. Your hands flew to his shoulders, clinging, grounding, anchoring you to something real while your mind drifted into something else—something otherworldly.

The pull came next.

A steady rhythm, slow and patient, like he was sipping you instead of drinking. Like he had all the time in the world. You could feel it, the way your blood left you in waves, not violent, not greedy—just…intimate. Like giving. Like surrender.

He groaned low against your neck, the sound vibrating through your bones.

"Fuck, you taste like sunlight," he rasped against your skin, voice thick with hunger and awe. "Like everythin’ warm I thought I’d forgotten."

Your head tipped further, offering him more.

You didn’t know when your legs opened wider, or when your hips rocked forward just to feel more of him. But his body shifted instinctively, meeting yours with a growl, his hand gripping your thigh now, possessive and unrelenting.

Your pulse faltered. Not from weakness, but from pleasure. From the unbearable knowing that he was inside you now, in the most ancient way. That your body had opened to him, and your blood had welcomed him.

Your moan was breathless.

"Remmick—"

He shushed you, mouth never leaving your throat.

"Don’t speak, dove. Just feel."

And you did.

You felt every lick. Every pull. Every sacred claim. You felt his tongue soothe where his fangs pierced, his hand slide higher along your thigh, his knee pushing between your legs until your breath stuttered out of you in something like a sob.

It was too much. It was not enough.

And when he finally pulled back, slow and reluctant, your blood on his lips like a mark, like a vow, he stared at you like you were holy.

Like he hadn’t fed on you.

Like he’d prayed.

The room was quiet, but your body wasn’t.

You felt every beat of your heart echo in the hollow where his mouth had been. A slow, reverent throb that pulsed through your neck, your chest, your thighs. It was like something had been lit beneath your skin, and now it smoldered there—glowing, aching, changed.

Remmick’s breath was uneven. His lips were stained red, parted just slightly, his jaw slack with something like awe. The burn of your blood still shimmered in his eyes, brighter now. Alive.

He looked undone.

And yet his hands were steady as he reached up, cupped your jaw in both palms, and tilted your face toward him. His thumb swept across your cheekbone like you might vanish if he didn’t touch you just right.

"You alright?" he asked, voice quieter now, roughened at the edges like a match just struck.

You nodded, though your limbs still trembled.

"I feel…" you swallowed, the word too small for what bloomed in your chest, "…warm."

He laughed, soft and almost bitter, and leaned his forehead against yours.

"You should. You’re inside me now. Every drop of you."

The words rooted somewhere deep. You didn’t flinch. Didn’t pull away. You could still feel the heat of his mouth, the bite, the pleasure that followed. It wasn’t just lust. It wasn’t just surrender. It was something older. Something binding.

"Does it hurt?" you asked, your fingers brushing the side of his neck, the line of his collarbone slick with sweat.

He looked at you like you’d asked the wrong question.

"Hurt?" he echoed. "Dove, it’s ecstasy."

You stared at him.

"You mean for you?"

He shook his head once.

"For us."

Then he pulled back just enough to look at you—really look. His gaze swept your features like he was committing them to memory. As if this moment, this very breath, was something sacred. His fingers moved to your throat again, this time to the place just above the bite, and he pressed lightly.

"You’ll bruise here," he said. "Won’t fade for a while."

"Will it heal?"

"Eventually."

"Do you want it to?"

His mouth curved, slow and wicked.

"No," he said. "I want the world to see what’s mine."

And before you could reply—before the heat in your belly could cool or your mind could gather itself—he kissed you.

Not soft.

Not careful.

His mouth claimed you like he’d already been inside you a thousand times and wanted to do it a thousand more. He kissed you like a man starving. Like a creature who’d gone too long without flesh, and now that he had it, he wasn’t letting go.

You tasted your own blood on his tongue.

And it tasted like forever.

The house knew.

It breathed deeper now. Its wood swelled, its walls sighed, its floorboards creaked in time with your heartbeat—as though it had taken you in too, accepted your offering, and now it wanted to keep you just like he did. Not as a guest. Not as a lover.

As a belonging.

Remmick hadn’t let you go.

Not when the kiss ended. Not when your blood slowed in his mouth. Not when your knees gave and your body folded forward into him. His arms had caught you like he knew the shape of your collapse. Like he’d been waiting for it. Like he’d never let you fall anywhere but into him.

He carried you now, one arm beneath your legs, the other braced around your back, his chest solid against yours.

"Don’t reckon you’re walkin’ after all that," he muttered, gaze fixed ahead, voice gone syrup-slow and thick with something possessive.

You didn’t argue. You couldn’t.

Your head rested against the place where his heart should’ve beat. But it was quiet there. Not lifeless—just other.

He carried you past rooms you hadn’t seen. A library, long abandoned, lined with crooked books and a grandfather clock that had no hands. A parlor soaked in velvet and silence. A door nailed shut from the outside, something heavy breathing behind it.

You didn’t ask.

He didn’t explain.

The room he took you to was nothing like the others.

It wasn’t grand.

It was personal.

The windows here were narrow and high, soft light slanting through the dusty glass in thin gold ribbons. The bed was simple but large, the sheets dark, the frame iron-wrought and worn smooth by time. A single cross hung above the headboard—but it had been turned upside down.

He set you down like you were breakable. Sat you on the edge of the bed, knelt once more to remove the slip still clinging to your body, inch by inch, as if undressing you were a sacrament.

"Y’ever wonder why I picked you?" he asked, voice low as the hush between thunderclaps.

Your breath stilled.

"I thought it was the blood."

He shook his head, his hands pausing at your hips.

"Nah, dove. Blood’s blood. Yours sings, sure. But it ain’t why I chose."

He looked up then, red eyes gleaming in the half-light.

"You remind me of the last thing I ever loved before I died."

The words landed like a stone in still water.

They rippled outward. Slow. Wide. Deep.

You stared at him, breath shallow, your skin bare under his hands, your throat still warm from where he’d fed. The room held its silence like breath behind gritted teeth. Outside, somewhere beyond the high windows, something moved through the trees—branches bending, wind pushing low and humid across the land—but in here, it was only the two of you.

Only his voice.

Only your blood between his teeth.

"What…what was she like?" you asked.

His thumbs drew circles at your hips, but his eyes drifted, not unfocused—just distant. Remembering.

"She had a mouth like yours. Sharp. Didn’t know when to shut it. Always speakin’ when she should’ve stayed quiet." A smile ghosted across his lips. "God, I loved that. I loved that she ain’t feared me even when she should’ve."

He exhaled through his nose, slow.

"But she didn’t get to finish bein’ mine."

Your brows pulled.

"What happened to her?"

He looked back at you then, and the heat in his gaze returned—not hunger, not even desire, but something deeper. Possessive. Terrifying in its tenderness.

"They tore her from me. Burned her in a chapel. Said she was a witch on account’a what I’d given her."

Your heart dropped into your stomach.

"Remmick—"

"She didn’t scream," he said, voice rough. "Didn’t cry. Just looked at me like she knew I’d find her again. And I have."

You froze.

His hands slid higher, up your ribs, his palms reverent.

"I don’t believe in fate. Not really. But you—" he leaned in, lips brushing your jaw, voice low like a spell, "you make me wanna believe in things I ain’t allowed to have."

You whispered against the curl of his mouth.

"And what do you think I am?"

He kissed the hinge of your jaw.

"My penance," he said. "And my reward."

You shivered.

"You said you saved me."

He nodded.

"I did."

"Why?"

He pulled back just enough to meet your eyes, and his voice dropped to a near whisper.

"‘Cause I ain’t lettin’ another thing I love burn."

You didn’t realize you were crying until he touched your face.

Not with hunger, not with heat, but with the kind of softness that had no business living in a man like him. His thumb caught a tear on your cheek like he’d been waiting for it, like it meant something sacred.

"You ain’t her," he murmured. "But you feel like the same song in a different key."

His voice cracked a little at the edges, not enough to ruin the shape of it, just enough to prove that something in him still bled.

You reached up, fingers trembling, and cupped the side of his neck. The skin there was warmer now. Still inhuman, still not quite alive, but it held your heat like it didn’t want to give it back. You felt the ridges of old scars beneath your palm. The echo of stories not told.

"I don’t know what I’m becoming," you said.

He leaned into your hand, eyes half-lidded.

"You’re becomin’ mine."

Then he kissed you again—not like before. Not full of fire. But slow, like he had all the time in the world to learn the shape of your mouth. His lips moved over yours with a kind of tenderness that made your bones ache. A kind of reverence that said this is where I end and begin again.

When he pulled back, your breath followed him.

The room shifted.

You felt it. Like the house had exhaled too.

"Lie down," he said, voice softer than it had ever been. "Let me hold what I almost lost."

You obeyed.

You lay back against the sheets that smelled like him, like dust and dark and something unnameable. The iron bed creaked softly beneath you, and the candlelight trembled with the movement. He undressed with quiet purpose, shirt sliding from his shoulders, buttons undone by slow fingers, trousers falling away to bare the sharp planes of his body.

And when he climbed over you, it wasn’t to take.

It was to be taken.

Remmick hovered above you, breath warm at your lips, hands braced on either side of your head. He looked down at you like he was staring through time. Like you were something he'd pulled from the fire and decided to keep even if it burned him too.

You’re mine, he whispered, but didn’t say it aloud.

He didn’t have to.

His body said it.

His mouth said it.

And when he finally eased inside you, slow and steady, filling you inch by trembling inch—your soul said it too.

His body hovered just above yours, every inch of him trembling with a control you didn’t quite understand—until you looked into his eyes.

That red glow was dimmer now. No less powerful, but softened by something raw. Something reverent.

Not hunger.

Not lust.

Not even possession.

Devotion.

The kind that didn’t speak. The kind that buried itself in the bones and never left.

His hand slid down the side of your face, tracing the curve of your cheek, then the line of your jaw, calloused fingers lingering in the hollow of your throat where your heartbeat thudded wild and uneven.

"Still fast," he murmured, half to himself.

"You’re heavy," you whispered, not in protest, but in awe. Every breath you took was filled with him.

He smirked, the corner of his mouth twitching in that crooked, wicked way of his.

"Ain’t even layin’ on you yet."

You didn’t laugh. Couldn’t. Your body was stretched too tight, strung out with anticipation and need. Every inch of you burned.

He leaned down then, not to kiss you, but to breathe you in. His nose skimmed your cheek, the edge of your ear, the curve of your throat already marked by his bite. His hands traced your ribs, the sides of your waist, slow and steady, like he was trying to learn you by touch alone.

"You’re shakin'," he whispered, voice low, thick with something close to worship.

"So are you."

A pause.

Then softer—truthfully,

"Yeah."

He kissed the inside of your wrist, then the space between your breasts, then lower still—his lips reverent as they moved over your belly, your hipbone, the softest parts of you.

"You ever had someone take their time with you?" he asked, mouth against your skin.

You didn’t speak.

"Didn’t think so," he muttered. "Shame."

His hand slid between your thighs, spreading you again—not rushed, not greedy, just gentle. Like he knew he’d already had the taste of you and now he wanted the feel.

"Tell me if it’s too much," he said.

"It already is."

He looked up at you then, his face half-shadowed, half-lit, and something flickered in his eyes.

"Good."

His cock brushed against your entrance, hot and heavy, and you nearly arched off the bed at the first contact. Not even inside. Just there. Teasing. Pressed to the slick mess he'd made of you earlier with his mouth.

He groaned deep.

"Fuck, you feel like sin."

You reached for him, pulled him down by the back of his neck until your mouths were inches apart.

"Then sin with me."

He didn’t hesitate.

He began to press in—slow. Devastatingly slow. The head of his cock stretching you open with a care that felt like madness. His hands gripped your hips as if holding himself back took more strength than killing ever had.

He moved in inch by inch, his breath hitched, jaw tight, sweat beginning to bead at his temple.

"Shit—ya takin’ me so good, dove. Just like that."

You moaned. Your fingers dug into his back. You were full of him and not even halfway there.

"Remmick—"

"I gotcha," he whispered. "Ain’t gonna let you break."

But he was already breaking you. Gently. Thoroughly. Beautifully.

He filled you like he’d been made for the task.

No sharp thrusts. No hurried rhythm. Just the unbearable slowness of it. The stretch. The burn. The drag of his cock as he sank deeper, deeper, deeper into you until there was nothing left untouched. Until your body stopped bracing and started opening.

You clung to him—hands fisted in the fabric of his shirt that still clung to his back, damp with sweat. He hadn’t even undressed all the way. There was something obscene about it, something holy, too—the way he kept his shirt on like this wasn’t about bareness, it was about belonging.

"That’s it," he rasped against your throat. "There she is."

Your moan was caught between breath and prayer.

He buried himself to the hilt.

And still—he didn’t move.

His hips pressed flush to yours, his breath shaky against your skin as he held himself there, nestled so deep inside you it felt like you’d never known emptiness before now. Like everything that came before this moment had just been the ache of waiting to be filled.

"You feel that?" he whispered, voice thick, almost reverent. "Where I am inside ya?"

You nodded. Couldn’t find your voice.

His lips brushed the shell of your ear.

"Ain’t no leavin’ now. I’ll always be in ya. Even when I ain’t."

You whimpered.

Not from pain. From how true it felt.

He moved then—barely. Just a slow roll of his hips, a gentle retreat and return. It was enough to make your breath hitch, your body arch, your legs wrap tighter around him without thinking.

"That’s right, dove. Let me in. Let me have it."

You didn’t even know what it was anymore.

Your body?

Your blood?

Your soul?

You’d already given them all.

And still, he took more.

But not cruelly.

Like a man kissing the mouth of a well after years of thirst. Like a thief who knew how to make you feel grateful for the stealing.

He found a rhythm that made the air vanish from your lungs.

Slow. Deep. Measured. His hips grinding just right, dragging his cock against every place inside you that had never known such touch. Every stroke sang with heat. Every breath he took turned your name into something more than a sound.

"Fuck, I could stay in you forever," he groaned. "Like this. Warm. Tight. Mine."

You dug your nails into his shoulders, legs trembling.

"Please," you whispered, though you didn’t know what you were asking for.

He did.

"Beg me," he said, dragging his mouth down your neck, over the bite he’d left. "Beg me to make you come with my cock in you."

"Remmick—"

"Say it."

You were already gone. Already shaking. Already his.

"Make me come," you breathed. "Please—God, please—"

His smile was sinful.

And then he fucked you.

His rhythm shifted—no longer slow, no longer sacred.

It was worship in the way fire worships a forest. The kind that devours. The kind that remakes.

Remmick braced a hand behind your thigh, hitching your leg higher as he thrust harder, deeper, dragging guttural sounds from his chest that you felt before you heard. The bed groaned beneath you, iron frame clanging soft against the wall in time with his hips. But it was your body that made the noise that filled the room—the gasps, the breaking sighs, the high whimper of his name torn raw from your throat.

He kissed your jaw, your collarbone, your shoulder, not like he was trying to be sweet but like he needed to taste every inch he claimed.

"You feel me in your belly yet?" he growled, words hot against your skin.

You nodded frantically, tears pricking the corners of your eyes from the sheer force of sensation.

"Say it," he panted, each thrust brutal and beautiful.

"Yes—yes, I feel you, Remmick, I—"

"You gonna come f’r me like a good girl?"

"Yes."

"Say my fuckin’ name when you do."

His hand slid between your bodies, finding your clit like he’d owned it in another life, and the moment his fingers circled that aching bundle of nerves, your vision went white.

Your body seized around him.

The sound you made was raw, wrecked, something no one but him should ever hear.

He kept fucking you through it, hissing curses through his teeth, chasing his own high with the rhythm of a man who’d waited centuries for the perfect fit.

And then he broke.

With your name groaned low and reverent in your ear, he came deep inside you, hips stuttering, breath ragged, body shuddering with the force of it. You felt every throb of his cock inside you, every spill of heat, every ounce of him taking root.

For a long, suspended moment, he didn’t move.

Only the sound of your breaths tangled together.

Your sweat mixing.

Your bodies still joined.

"That’s it," he whispered hoarsely, pressing his forehead to yours. "That’s how I know you’re mine."

The house exhaled around you.

The candle sputtered in its jar, flame dancing low and crooked, like even it had been made breathless by what it had witnessed. Somewhere in the walls, the wood groaned—settling. Sighing. Accepting.

You didn’t move. Couldn’t.

Your body was a temple razed and rebuilt in a single night, still pulsing with the memory of his mouth, his weight, the stretch of him inside you like a secret only your bones would remember. Every nerve hummed low and soft beneath your skin, like your blood hadn’t figured out how to move without his rhythm guiding it.

Remmick stayed inside you.

His body was heavy atop yours, but not crushing. His head tucked into the curve of your neck, the same place he’d bitten, the same place he’d worshipped like it held some holy truth. His breath came slow and ragged, the rise and fall of his chest matching yours as if your lungs had struck the same pace without meaning to.

"Don’t move yet," he muttered, voice wrecked and hoarse. "Wanna stay here just a minute longer."

You let your hand drift through his hair, damp with sweat, curls sticking to his forehead. You carded through them lazily, mind blank, heart full.

He pressed a kiss to your throat. Then another, just above your collarbone.

"You still with me?" he asked, quieter now.

You nodded.

"Good," he murmured. "Didn’t mean to fuck the soul outta ya. Just…couldn’t help it."

You let out the softest laugh, and he smiled into your skin.

His hand slid down your side, tracing the curve of your waist, your hip, the spot where your thigh met his. His fingers moved slowly, not with lust, but with a kind of quiet awe.

"Y’know what you feel like?" he whispered.

"What?"

"Home."

The word struck something inside you. Something tender. Something deep.

He lifted his head then, just enough to look down at you. His eyes had faded from red to something darker, something richer—garnet in low light. The kind of color only seen in blood and wine and promises too old to be remembered by name.

"You still think this is just hunger?" he asked.

You blinked at him, dazed.

"It was never just hunger," he said. "Not with you."

The silence between you was warm now.

Not empty. Not tense. Just quiet, the kind that comes after thunder, when the storm’s rolled through and the trees are still deciding whether to stand or kneel.

You felt it in your limbs—heavy, humming, holy. The afterglow of something you didn’t have language for.

Remmick hadn’t moved far.

He still blanketed your body like a second skin, one arm braced beneath your shoulders, the other tracing idle shapes across your hip as if he were still mapping the terrain of you. His cock, softening but still nestled inside, pulsed faintly with the last of what he’d given you.

And he had given you something. Not just release. Not just blood. Something older. Something that whispered now in the place between your ribs.

You turned your head to look at him.

His gaze was already on you.

"What happens now?" you asked, barely above a whisper.

He didn’t answer right away.

Instead, he ran the back of his fingers along your cheekbone, down the side of your neck, pausing over the place where his mark had already begun to bruise.

"You askin’ what happens tonight," he murmured, "or what happens after?"

You blinked slowly. "Both."

He let out a breath through his nose, the sound tired but not cold.

"Tonight, I’ll hold you. Long as you’ll let me. Won’t leave this bed unless you beg me to. Might even make ya cry again, if you keep lookin’ at me like that."

You flushed, and he smiled.

"As for after…"

He looked past you then, toward the ceiling, like the truth was written in the beams.

"Ain’t never planned that far. Not with anyone. Just fed. Fucked. Moved on."

"But not with me."

His eyes snapped back to yours. Serious now.

"No, dove. Not with you."

You swallowed the knot rising in your throat.

"Why?"

His jaw flexed, tongue darting briefly across his lower lip before he answered.

"‘Cause I been alone too long. Lived too long. Thought I was too far gone to want anythin’ that didn’t bleed beneath me."

He leaned closer, forehead resting against yours, his next words no louder than a ghost’s sigh.

"But you—you made me want somethin’ tender. Somethin’ breakable."

"That doesn’t make sense."

"Don’t gotta. Nothin’ about you ever has. And yet here you are."

You let your eyes drift shut, just for a moment, and whispered into the stillness between your mouths.

"So I stay?"

He didn’t hesitate.

"You stay."

The candle had burned low.

Its glow flickered long shadows across the walls—your bodies painted in gold and blood-tinged bronze, limbs tangled in sheets that still clung with sweat and want. The house had quieted again, the way an animal settles when it knows its master is content. Outside, the wind threaded through the trees in soft moans, like the Delta herself was eavesdropping.

Neither of you spoke for a while. You didn’t need to.

Your fingers traced lazy patterns across Remmick’s chest—over his scars, the slope of muscle, the faint rise and fall beneath your palm. You still half-expected no heartbeat, but it was there, slow and stubborn, like he’d stolen it back just for you.

He watched you. One arm draped across your waist, his thumb stroking your bare back like you might fade if he stopped.

"You still ain’t askin’ the question you really wanna ask," he said, voice rough from silence and sleep.

You paused.

"What question is that?"

He tipped his head toward you, resting his chin on his knuckles.

"You wanna know if I turned you."

Your heart gave a traitorous flutter.

"And did you?"

He shook his head.

"Nah. Not yet."

"Why not?"

His fingers stilled. Then resumed.

"’Cause you ain’t asked me to."

You looked up at him sharply.

"Would you?"

A long beat passed. Then he nodded once.

"If it was you askin’. If it was real."

Your breath caught.

"And if I don’t?"

His gaze didn’t waver.

"Then I’ll stay with you. ‘Til you’re old. ‘Til your hands shake and your bones ache and your eyes stop lookin’ at me like I’m the only thing that ever made you feel alive."

Your throat tightened.

"That sounds awful."

He smiled, slow and aching.

"It sounds human."

You looked at him for a long time. At the man who had killed, who had bled you, who had tasted every part of you—body and soul—and still asked nothing unless you gave it.

"Would it hurt?"

His hand slid up, fingers curling beneath your jaw, tilting your face to his.

"It’d hurt," he said. "But not more than bein’ without you would."

The quiet stretched long and low.

His words hung in the space between your mouths like smoke—something sweet and terrible, something tasted before it was fully breathed in.

Your chest rose and fell against his slowly, and for a long time, you said nothing. You just listened. To the house settling around you. To the wind curling past the windows. To the steady thrum of blood still echoing faintly in your ears.

And beneath it all—

You heard memory.

It came soft at first. A shape, not a sound. The slick thud of your knees hitting the alley pavement. The scream you didn’t recognize as your own. Your brother’s blood, warm and fast, pumping between your fingers like water from a broken pipe. His mouth slack. His eyes wide.

You remembered screaming to the sky. Not to God.

Just up.

Because you knew He’d stopped listening.

And then—

He came.

Out of nothing. Out of dark.

You remembered the slow scrape of his boots on the gravel. The silhouette of him under the weak yellow glow of a flickering streetlamp. You remembered the quiet way he spoke.

"You want him to live?"

You didn’t answer with words. You just nodded, crying so hard you couldn’t breathe. And he’d knelt—right there in the blood—and laid his hand flat against your brother’s chest.

You never saw what he did. Only saw your brother’s eyes flutter. Only heard his breath return, sudden and wet.

And then he looked at you.

Not your brother.

Remmick.

He looked at you like he’d already taken something.

And he had.

Now, years later, lying in the hush of his house, your body still joined to his, you could still feel that moment thrumming beneath your skin. The moment when everything shifted. When your life became borrowed.

You looked up at him now, breathing steady, lips parted like a prayer just barely forming.

"I’ve already given you everything."

He shook his head.

"Not this."

He pressed two fingers to your chest, right over your heart.

"This is still yours."

"And you want it?"

He didn’t smile. Didn’t look away.

"I want it to keep beatin’. Forever. With mine."

You stared at him.

You thought about that alley. About your brother’s eyes opening again.

About how no one else came.

And you made your choice.

"Then take it."

Remmick stilled.

"Don’t say it unless you mean it, dove."

"I do."

His voice was barely more than a breath.

"You sure?"

You reached up, touched his face, fingers tracing the sharp line of his jaw.

"I’ve never been more sure of anything in my life."

His eyes shimmered—deep red now, alive with something wild and tender.

"Then I’ll make you eternal," he whispered. "And I’ll never let the world take you from me."

He didn’t rush.

Not now. Not with this.

Remmick looked at you like you were something rare—something holy—like he couldn’t believe you’d said it, even as your voice still echoed between the walls.

Then he moved.

Not with hunger. Not with heat.

With purpose.

He sat up, kneeling beside you on the bed, and pulled the sheet slowly down your body. His eyes drank you in again, but this time there was no heat in them. Just reverence. As if you were the altar, and he the sinner who’d finally been granted absolution.

"You sure you want this?" he asked one last time, voice soft, like the hush of water in a cathedral.

You nodded, throat tight.

"I want forever."

His jaw clenched. A tremble passed through him like he’d heard those words in another life and lost them before they were ever his.

He leaned down.

His hand cupped the back of your head, the other settled flat on your chest, palm over your heart.

"Close your eyes, dove."

You did.

And then—

You felt him.

His breath. His lips. The soft, cool press of his mouth against your neck. But he didn’t bite.

Not yet.

He kissed the mark he’d already left. Then higher. Then lower. Slow. Measured. Your body melted beneath him, your hands curling into the sheets.

And then—

A whisper against your skin.

"I’ll be gentle. But you’ll remember this forever."

And he sank his fangs in.

It wasn’t like the first time.

It wasn’t lust.

It wasn’t climax.

It was rebirth.

Pain bloomed sharp and bright—but only for a heartbeat. Then the warmth flooded in. Then the cold. Then the ache. Your pulse stuttered once, then surged. It was like drowning and being pulled to the surface at once. Like everything you’d ever been burned away and something older moved in to take its place.

He held you as it happened.

Cradled you like something delicate.

His mouth sealed over the wound, drinking slow, but not to feed. To anchor you. To tether you to him.

You felt yourself go limp. The world turned strange. Light and dark bled into each other. Your breath faded. Your heartbeat fluttered like wings against glass.

And then—

It stopped.

Silence.

Stillness.

And in the space where your heart had once beat…

You heard his.

Then—

Your eyes opened.

The world looked different.

Sharper.

Brighter.

Every shadow deeper. Every color richer. The candlelight burned gold-red and alive. The scent of the night air was so thick it choked you—smoke, soil, blood, him.

Remmick hovered above you, lips stained crimson, breathing hard like he’d just returned from war.

And when he looked at you—

You saw yourself reflected in his eyes.

He smiled.

"Welcome home, darlin’."

#turns out vampire jack o’connell is my roman empire #the only plot here is what if a monster loved you too gently and then ruined you anyway“#yes he eats you out like it’s the last supper. no i will not be taking criticism at this time #sinners 2025 #sinners au #sinners fic #remmick #remmick x reader #sinners remmick #jack o'connell

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